"However, new research from Harvard Business School and Duke University paints a more nuanced picture — rerouting appears to be lower than is imagined.

While trade rerouting through Vietnam does occur, its scale appears far smaller than previously thought. The study found that in 2021, about 16.1 per cent of Vietnamese exports to the US — roughly US$15.5 billion — could be classified as potential rerouting when analysed at the product level. But when the researchers examined individual firms — tracking specific products flowing from China through Vietnam to the US — the figure fell to just 1.8 per cent, or US$1.7 billion."

https://fulcrum.sg/vietnam-china-and-rerouting-when-percepti...

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenroberts/2024/06/25/us-import...

- Chinese imports into the United States are down 19.78% from April of 2018 — when Trump first started imposing tariffs — to today, or $31.88 billion.

- Cell phones: Big winner is India. China has gone from a market share of 63.59% in 2018 to a still strong 42.14%. That’s a decline of 33.73%.

- Computers: Big winners are Taiwan, Vietnam. China has gone from a market share from 53.45% in the first four months of 2018 to 28.11%, a decline of 47.40%.

- Furniture: Big winner is Vietnam. China, meanwhile, accounted for 23.55% this year, down from 48.54% in 2018, a decline of 51.49% compared to a gain of 88.67% for Vietnam.

- TVs and monitors: Big winner is Vietnam. Mexico overtook China as the import leader in this category just before the pandemic and has remained on top. It gained market share from China, which fell from 53.68% in 2018, when it was No. 1, to 33.64%, a 37.32% decline.

- Digital storage devices: Big winners are Korea, Vietnam. China accounted for 39.50% of those imports in 2018, more than double that of any other nation. In 2024, its percentage is 4.23% and it ranks No. 9.

- Digital cameras: Yep, Vietnam again. China, meanwhile, has seen its share go from a majority, at 50.09%, to 17.57%, a decline of 64.92%.

2.) Some of the data that it's based on is up to 2023. And some are up to 2020

3.) There has been massive movement of manufacturing out of China between 2020 and 2024. I won't provide the references here, as there are too many to mention, from Japanese/Taiwanese/South Korean/European/American companies. They are easily chatgpted/googled. Also the reason why Shenzhen and Guangzhou has suffered deeper drop of real estate price and employment.

4.) In 2024, Mexico was the biggest exporter to US. United States was the biggest exporter to Europe. US was the largest export destination of Japan.

5.) Trump's 60%-100% tariff on China will accelerate the exodus of manufacturing

stop spreading misinformation. go look at largest companies by market cap in the world https://companiesmarketcap.com/ and you'll see US domination while China has a few handful of companies, mostly banks.

> government and elites realized that we’re screwed

That's more like China. That's why 15k rich chinese are fleeing the country in 2024 https://www.forbes.com/sites/miltonezrati/2024/07/03/high-ne..., the most of any country in the world. US isn't the one where the stock market and real estate has collapsed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZjaE8mDbq68

Here are some good posts on why nobody wants deflation:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskEconomics/comments/uzq5bu/why_is...

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskEconomics/comments/mbsxyl/can_so...

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskEconomics/comments/yotf0c/i_dont...

also coincidentally and recently, China’s Xi Jinping asked ‘What’s so bad about deflation?’ amid economic slowdown https://fortune.com/2024/12/29/china-economy-deflation-xi-ji...

- Battery Startup Opens Chicago Plant as US Seeks to Curb Reliance on China https://www.nanograf.com/media/battery-startup-opens-chicago...

- Our own YC: https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/industry/energy

- China’s startup scene is dead as investors pull out—’Today, we are like lepers’ https://finance.yahoo.com/news/china-startup-scene-dead-inve...

China does have a current advantage on lithium battery and rare earth materials - dumb technologies that US and allies can replicate fairly quickly, less than a year. EUV and 3nm and below on the other hand, will take decades, since it involves a number of different and deep technologies controlled by dozens of companies. China has thrown $150B on it since 2014, and has only come up with low yield/unprofitable 7nm via existing DUV machines.

> 80% GDP

China's demographics will more than HALF to 500M by 2100, if not earlier, while US grows to close to 400M by then. Someone actually theorizes that China's population is already only 800M right now https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fR5F_8dSjOw

Also, a lot of that GDP is debatable in 2024, when real estate prices have dropped by more than 50% in tier 2 and below cities, and deflation has raged on.

2.) Chinese models have to censor a long list of words that threatens the government, which makes them super dumb. List of stupid words example: sprinkle pepper, accelerationism, my emperor, lifelong control, etc. and the list of censored words grow(!!) as Chinese citizens try different combination of words to escape censorship.

3.) not even sure what this sentence means and how it makes Chinese models better

[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-12-09/china-is-...

Number of irrelevant countries. US's allies are Europe, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Canada, Mexico, Australia, etc. 80% of the world's wealth. and 95% of the world's top technologies.

> guess where these countries are buying their drones from

Soon, not China. China Is Cutting Off Drone Supplies Critical to Ukraine War Effort [1]. China is reportedly making drones for Russia instead, according to multiple intelligence officials.

[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-12-09/china-is-...

China Is Cutting Off Drone Supplies Critical to Ukraine War Effort [1]. China is reportedly making drones for Russia instead, according to multiple intelligence officials.

[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-12-09/china-is-...

Good thing Europe woke up earlier this year. impact of the EU’s tariffs on Chinese EV manufacturers. In November, Chinese automakers captured just 7.4% of Europe’s EV market, a noticeable drop from 8.2% in October and their lowest share since March [1].

As for US, the 100% tariff has safely protected America from Chinese EVs thus far.

[1]https://www.autoblog.com/news/chinas-ev-invasion-hits-a-wall

If we are talking about China's credit, China has a lot of subprime loans to belt and road countries that have very little income, and lot of subprime loans to their citizens, which recently a scholar reported that 900M of them make less than $400/month.

China being the largest creditor doesn't mean much when a lot of their debt is issued to belt and road countries that can never be paid back, and will be written off in the future. It does have a large US debt holdings, but that has shrank from 1.27T (2013) to 772B (2024), and a large part of that being used for cross border transactions.

Here are some actual experts take on China: Longtime China bull Ray Dalio fears economy faces problems as severe as Japan in 1990 https://fortune.com/2024/09/18/ray-dalio-china-property-bubb...

or Private equity investors trapped in China as top firms fail to find exit deals https://www.ft.com/content/0575e216-8dae-4df6-bf50-312f78468...

or Starbucks reportedly mulling China business stake sale https://www.worldcoffeeportal.com/Latest/News/2024/November/...

Having debt to GDP ratio of 310% and local governments being unable to pay out salaries for many months is a big sign of being broke. (google or chatgpt the salary news, they are everywhere)

Consumer spending dropping 20% y/y in November in Beijing and Shanghai is a sign of being broke.

52,000 EV-related companies shut down in China in 2023 and an increase of 90% on the year before, where most EV companies were the targets of government subsidies, is a sign of being broke.

30% drop in revenues from land sales in 2024, which the local government derive most of its revenue on, is a sign of being broke.

China is not self sufficient; it imports 80% of consumed soybeans and other food products, and 90% of semiconductor equipments. Nor is it even remotely at the same level as Japan when Japan entered the lost decades. 600M Chinese citizens earned less than $100/month as of 2020. Recently, a scholar reported 900M Chinese citizens earned less than $400/month.

You can't start a war when you are truly broke, much like China is today. And China is aging super fast, unlike Germany or US during the 30s.