Ezra Klein

So the process you're describing here, the Chinese government identifies solar panels as an industry. They, using a variety of mechanisms, absolutely flood the country with subsidized financing to become a solar panel company. And you get very strange things here.

So the process you're describing here, the Chinese government identifies solar panels as an industry. They, using a variety of mechanisms, absolutely flood the country with subsidized financing to become a solar panel company. And you get very strange things here.

Like there was an example a couple of years back where, you know, one of the big real estate firms there that was in crisis tried to become an EV firm because then they could get a bunch of finance. Yeah. China absorbs – the Chinese government absorbs a huge amount of waste, failure, and graft, cylindra times a thousand, things we would never accept in this country. Yes.

Like there was an example a couple of years back where, you know, one of the big real estate firms there that was in crisis tried to become an EV firm because then they could get a bunch of finance. Yeah. China absorbs – the Chinese government absorbs a huge amount of waste, failure, and graft, cylindra times a thousand, things we would never accept in this country. Yes.

So a bunch of these firms just pocket money for nothing. A bunch of them fail. Right. But in that, on the other side of that process of failure, waste, graft, you get these very, very potent national champions, they're called, that then the Chinese government puts a huge amount of resources behind. And I want to add one other thing because it speaks to some of the trade fights we're having.

So a bunch of these firms just pocket money for nothing. A bunch of them fail. Right. But in that, on the other side of that process of failure, waste, graft, you get these very, very potent national champions, they're called, that then the Chinese government puts a huge amount of resources behind. And I want to add one other thing because it speaks to some of the trade fights we're having.

For China to have the money to do this – to not require more efficiency from their own companies and their own investments. Part of the way they're doing it is keeping wages suppressed in their country. Part of the way they're doing it is exporting much more than they consume. Part of the way they're doing it is maintaining a kind of imbalanced economy, highly focused on production.

For China to have the money to do this – to not require more efficiency from their own companies and their own investments. Part of the way they're doing it is keeping wages suppressed in their country. Part of the way they're doing it is exporting much more than they consume. Part of the way they're doing it is maintaining a kind of imbalanced economy, highly focused on production.

But going back to this idea of the gym, the fitness, like we understand in America, right, capitalism, survival of the fittest, right? They don't demand that you're very fit at the beginning. They demand that you're fit at the end. We actually demand, with the exception of some VC investments that are fairly – usually fairly small scale. We demand that you're fit at the beginning.

But going back to this idea of the gym, the fitness, like we understand in America, right, capitalism, survival of the fittest, right? They don't demand that you're very fit at the beginning. They demand that you're fit at the end. We actually demand, with the exception of some VC investments that are fairly – usually fairly small scale. We demand that you're fit at the beginning.

I want to go back then to this question of the Washington Consensus, and it's the reason I wanted to have this conversation. I get very nervous. when both parties agree on something too much.

I want to go back then to this question of the Washington Consensus, and it's the reason I wanted to have this conversation. I get very nervous. when both parties agree on something too much.

And what I find now is that among Democrats and Republicans alike, you put it that you can't say a nice word about China, but I would put it as it is a completely universal belief that would be politically lethal in most cases to question if you have any national ambitions, that openness towards China would be the right strategy.

And what I find now is that among Democrats and Republicans alike, you put it that you can't say a nice word about China, but I would put it as it is a completely universal belief that would be politically lethal in most cases to question if you have any national ambitions, that openness towards China would be the right strategy.

You can have Trump's version of hostility, unfathomably high tariffs, very antagonistic language. You can have sort of a more democratic version of hostility, the Biden administration trying to wall off a bunch of advanced technologies, which maybe was the right call, Nancy Pelosi visiting Taiwan. But what you can't have is the view that even if China isn't liberalizing China,

You can have Trump's version of hostility, unfathomably high tariffs, very antagonistic language. You can have sort of a more democratic version of hostility, the Biden administration trying to wall off a bunch of advanced technologies, which maybe was the right call, Nancy Pelosi visiting Taiwan. But what you can't have is the view that even if China isn't liberalizing China,

That given how interconnected we already are, more interconnection and an effort to pull this relationship back from the brink where both sides are ratcheting up hostility and preparing for the possibility of all-out war, that that would be the right approach. Look, you've been covering this for a long time. Tell me how you think that consensus developed.

That given how interconnected we already are, more interconnection and an effort to pull this relationship back from the brink where both sides are ratcheting up hostility and preparing for the possibility of all-out war, that that would be the right approach. Look, you've been covering this for a long time. Tell me how you think that consensus developed.

How did we move from where we were even under the Obama administration when they're negotiating TPP as a way to sort of move trade away but to pivot to Asia to be more engaged? How do we move from that space, which is a much softer form of competition, to what happens under Trump, then Biden, then Trump? Which is, I think, one of the sharper foreign policy changes we've seen in recent decades.

How did we move from where we were even under the Obama administration when they're negotiating TPP as a way to sort of move trade away but to pivot to Asia to be more engaged? How do we move from that space, which is a much softer form of competition, to what happens under Trump, then Biden, then Trump? Which is, I think, one of the sharper foreign policy changes we've seen in recent decades.