On Jun 27, 2008, at 9:16 AM, shag wrote:
> there was some debate on the list about how the economic meltdown
> in the
> u.s. won't hurt countries that are detached from the global
> circuits of
> capital. that being outside or detached makes them less dependent
> and, i
> guess, they'll survive and maybe even triumph as the current
> imperial world
> order crashes and burns.
>
> i was hearing on the radio yesterday, the china's being hit hard by
> our
> lack of spending here in the u.s. was china supposed to have been
> outside
> these circuits or was it just places like s. africa?
The original "decoupling" argument, popular last summer and fall as the U.S. credit crisis was coming to a boil, was that Europe and Asia would remain largely unhurt by our economic troubles, because they're running largely on their own juice and we're coming to count for squat in the world. It wasn't so much about peripheral regions. So far, the decouplers have a point, though considering the hits the U.S. econ has taken, it's amazing growth is around 0% and not -3%.
Doug