this post was submitted on 11 Apr 2024
74 points (98.7% liked)
Europe
8324 readers
1 users here now
News/Interesting Stories/Beautiful Pictures from Europe πͺπΊ
(Current banner: Thunder mountain, Germany, π©πͺ ) Feel free to post submissions for banner pictures
Rules
(This list is obviously incomplete, but it will get expanded when necessary)
- Be nice to each other (e.g. No direct insults against each other);
- No racism, antisemitism, dehumanisation of minorities or glorification of National Socialism allowed;
- No posts linking to mis-information funded by foreign states or billionaires.
Also check out [email protected]
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
My general/summarized thoughts:
At the end of the day, if we do protectionism and bar China, I can only hope we do enact more subsidies, close if not on par with China, for our own industries so that we accelerate our transition to green energy. I don't really personally care if we ban Chinese products, I just think this is a bit of cope about someone who's just... doing better economic policies, that we should also be doing, instead of crying about "unfair market competition" as if free market absolutism is necessarily good (China isn't doing enough "free market" so they're "unfair", even though we're doing the same to a slightly lesser degree).
My personal preference would be doing what Norway is doing: setting up democratic state run organizations that do green tech so that we socialize the profits we do make from such an industry. That's Norway's approach to hydropower, where they own the vast majority of it, and they're ramping up efforts towards wind energy too. They also have a state oil industry, but obviously I'm not too happy about that in the context of climate change - however, it has been incredibly economically beneficial for the people of Norway, so we should likely copy their strategy for green tech.
Responding to specific paragraphs:
"Artificially cheap" is basically a loaded term for "subsidized". We do the same thing for certain industries here in Europe, there's really nothing special about it. In fact, we should probably be doing more subsidies.
Maybe we should increase our own subsidies instead? I really don't see the argument here - would we transition to a green economy too fast when climate change is a crisis in waiting? Why are cheap products a problem all of a sudden, I thought that was the primary reason we started using China to mass produce stuff on our behalf, i.e. we took advantage of their horrible working conditions that we know led to suicides and anti-jump fences. But now all of a sudden cheap stuff is a problem?
All of these sound like good things we should be doing. In fact, we are doing a little bit more of transparency (which is what "forced tech transfers" are, in less loaded terms - it's literally just making corporations share knowledge and cooperate) e.g. supply chain transparency in Europe is growing. Less domestic red tape sounds like a good thing? Norway has a similar "problem" of a government being a little bit too efficient. Obviously that's not a bad thing - maybe we should figure out why we're comparatively slow?
As in, Tesla has received Chinese subsidies. It has also received US and (I believe) EU subsidies too. And I'm talking about supply side subsidies, demand side subsidies like governments paying part of the price of EV cars have provided tens of billions in plenty of EU and EEA countries.
@honey_im_meat_grinding@ lemmy.blahaij.zone
No. Especially in this case, it is also a term for cheap manufacturing processes by ignoring environmental and social norms, including the use of forced labour. There's ample evidence for this. For example, it is the reason why European car makers were forced to quit their collaboration with a joint venture in Xinjiang.
That's a good idea, but it only works if and when both sides apply it and acting in good faith. However, there is, for example, no way of an independent investigation over so many alleged human rights abuses in China, even a simple market research (or shooting a photo in the public space) may lead to behind closed-door trials for espionage, ending with long jail terms. Let alone that China intentionally produces overcapacity, while at the same time protects its own domestic market. Things like these have nothing to do with transparency and collaboration.
These are just a few examples you may have (intentionally?) missed in your statement as it doesn't describe the economic reality well. Your anti-western sentiment is somewhat weird if I may say so.
Then just target the anti-environmental, social, and forced labour parts? This article is specifically about unfair subsidies, not what you just mentioned. You're moving the goalpost.
Supply chain transparency in the countries that have enacted laws like that, apply internationally:
I literally described Norway in a very positive way - my ideal approach. Are they no longer western? Or are you just being a weirdo because I don't like propaganda in general? I don't like Chinese propaganda, and I don't like whatever you're doing by having a profile consisting of 90% news articles about China. You're basically doing marketing by constantly pushing articles about China, similar to how adverts are constantly pushed in our faces. A normal person might post a few articles about China here and there, but your history is 90%.
The supply chain laws in the West are widely useless if China makes it impossible to independently investigate the Chinese parts of these very supply chains. Given this lack of transparency, is a trusted cooperation possible? (The answer is: no, it isn't.)
You are just repeating your statements and ignoring mine it seems.
This is silly and absolutist reasoning. The law exists to encourage companies to push their suppliers for more ethical behaviour, if China won't allow transparency, then it's a violation of the supply chain transparency law and they'll have to choose between A) more transparency, or B) not being on the receiving end of deals. The crucial difference is this only targets the things you pointed out that weren't even on topic to subsidies to begin with, but instead we're enacting protectionist policies and complaining about "unfairness" with the amount of subsidies they have.
That's funny considering you changed the subject. I'm trying to stay on topic with the original article talking about subsidies, you're moving the goalpost. I don't have to respond to things that aren't on topic.
What do you think is China choosing, A or B?
I call you out for the accusation of being silly, that's not a level worth continuing any discussion.
Do you know? Are you prescient? Don't pretend you can predict what China would do - especially rich coming from Mr. 90% Articles About China.
You're still yapping on about the off topic thing I see. Come back when we're talking about subsidies again please. If you have to steer the conversation away when you're losing the argument, onto a topic I don't even necessarily disagree with (forced labour, environmental and social concerns)... I don't know what to say, you're just being a weirdo.