Story thread · 2 reports / 2 sources

U.S. trade chief calls trying to change China's economy "crazy"

axios.com · 2h · first reportShare

As Europe grapples with its own China shock , the U.S. has largely given up on trying to persuade Beijing to change the export-heavy economic model that's helping fuel it. It's a sharp break from years of U.S. economic diplomacy — including most recently during the Biden administration . What they're saying: "We did that for 25 years with our best people, and everything got worse," U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer told Axios in an interview this week, referring to efforts to persuade China to shift toward greater consumption. "All these things where they say, 'Well, let's do more engagement. Let's talk more about savings and investment,'" Greer said. "That's crazy to me." "If we continued to do what they were saying, we would have 0% growth, like Canada, like the U.K., like Germany," Greer said. (Germany barely grew last year, while Canada grew 1.7% and the U.K. 1.3%, compared with 2.1% in the U.S.) The big picture: The U.S. has spent years building a tariff wall against a slew