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  • On this episode of China Uncensored,

  • Donald Trump blames China.

  • Again.

  • Hi, welcome to China Uncensored.

  • I'm your host Chris Chappell.

  • Presidential candidate Donald Trump is no stranger to controversy,

  • whether it's making sexual innuendos about other politicians

  • or saying China is raping the United States.

  • "We can't continue to allow China to rape our country,

  • and that's what they're doing."

  • And who's to blame?

  • The victim of course!

  • China's great. No problem.

  • I'm not angry with China… I'm angry at our leaders,

  • because they are grossly incompetent

  • and they shouldn't have ever been elected to do this job.”

  • Now if you're like me,

  • your reaction to this was probably the same as your reaction to,

  • really, this entire election cycle

  • Jane, stop this crazy thing! Jane!”

  • Sorry George,

  • there's no stopping this crazy, out-of-control ride.

  • So is Trump correct that China is "raping" the United States?

  • Well, some are pointing out that perhaps Trump is being

  • a tad insensitive in his use of descriptors.

  • But the United States does have a huge trade deficit with China.

  • In 2015, the US bought $480 billion worth of Chinese goods.

  • That's about one-fifth of all US imports.

  • But the US only sold about $115 billion of goods to China last year.

  • And that marked the biggest annual trade deficit with China ever.

  • According to a 2013 report by the American Economic Review,

  • one million American factory jobs have been lost to China.

  • So what could Donald Trump actually do about this if elected?

  • We'll, he's suggested this:

  • a 45% tariff on Chinese goods.

  • Which he cannot do.

  • You can't impose tariffs on entire countries.

  • What you can do under existing laws

  • is to set out specific categories of imports

  • you want to put a tariff on,

  • like the US did to Chinese tires in 2009.

  • The result?

  • Tires just got imported from Indonesia, Mexico, and Thailand.

  • And no, there were not suddenly more US jobs manufacturing tires.

  • But it's not easy to place these tariffs

  • because you'd have to prove specific violations of trade rules

  • to the World Trade Organization.

  • They're the ones that regulate global commerce.

  • You see, when the WTO was set up in 1995,

  • the rules laid out didn't really take into consideration

  • dealing with China

  • a country where the Communist Party

  • has pretty murky ties to just about everything,

  • including the handling of the economy.

  • It's not really communism,

  • but the government is way more involved than in most countries.

  • If a president Trump decide to say "screw it"

  • and did impose a broad China tariff, well,

  • that would kind of mean global trade laws no longer matter.

  • And that goes against US policy

  • going as far back as the end of World War II.

  • It was thought that increasing international trade

  • would prevent international conflict.

  • And so the US has been lowering tariffs.

  • According to the World Bank,

  • the US imposes some of the lowest tariff rates in the world.

  • And US manufacturing output right now is at an all-time high.

  • So it's not that China is stealing US manufacturing jobs,

  • it's that technology is stealing US jobs.

  • Because a lot of the jobs that used to be done by humans

  • have become automated.

  • Like bowling alley pinsetters.

  • Or switchboard operators.

  • Or checkout clerks.

  • And having a trade deficit is not in of itself a bad thing.

  • The US economy runs on consumption,

  • and boy are we good at it!

  • "Can he break his own record of 68 hot dogs in 10 minutes?

  • With seconds on the clock,

  • [Joey] Chestnut manages to do the impossible."

  • That also means China has a lot of US dollars floating around.

  • And though that's not going into buying US goods,

  • it is being used to buy US services.

  • According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis,

  • the US has a service surplus with China.

  • Though in 2014, it was only $28 billion,

  • so not nearly as much as the trade deficit.

  • But here's the thing: Trump has a point.

  • No, not that China is stealing our jobs directly.

  • But according to one expert I interviewed,

  • the US loses an estimated $5 trillion a year to China

  • yes, trillion

  • due to intellectual property theft

  • spearheaded by the Chinese military.

  • Not to mention all this trade and theft

  • are basically what prop up a cruel, tyrannical regime.

  • It's just that, when you put things like this

  • "We can't continue to allow China to rape our country…"

  • though people will listen, they might not take it seriously.

  • What do you think?

  • Leave your comments below.

  • Once again I'm Chris Chappell, and I'm voting for

  • cthulhu!

On this episode of China Uncensored,

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