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Re:‘The Trains Are Slower Because They Slowed the Trains Down’ by bsder on Wednesday March 14, 2018 @03:32AM (#16582987)
> And this isn't even getting into the longer term prospects of the very real danger of the efficiency and scale of China starting to eat into the core economies of other nations as they move away from simple manufacturing and beginning moving up the value chain, as we are now seeing.

I wasn't really that worried about China as they are automating extremely quickly and have shown no better ability to utilize the displaced people any better than anybody in the West--see the recent layoffs in steel and coal in China along with the corresponding strikes and protests.

Now with Xi Jinping being President for Life, I'm even less worried. Xi Jingping will regard striking and protesting workers as a threat to his power and he will suppress them. This will break what little feedback there is in China between the working class and the ruling class and the decisions will become increasingly unmoored from external reality.

If I were TSMC, I would start moving fab lines out of Taiwan.

Re:‘The Trains Are Slower Because They Slowed the Trains Down’ by smcl on Wednesday March 14, 2018 @07:39AM (#16583977)
I think I'm missing something - TSMC should move their fabs off the island because of some goings-on in the mainland? The countries are obviously connected in various ways, but they're definitely not yet united so I'm struggling to see what the reasoning here is
Re:‘The Trains Are Slower Because They Slowed the Trains Down’ by bsder on Wednesday March 14, 2018 @09:05PM (#16589738)
> The countries are obviously connected in various ways, but they're definitely not yet united so I'm struggling to see what the reasoning here is

China doesn't see it this way. And the only thing keeping China from steamrolling both Taiwan and Hong Kong are the fact that it would decimate the economies and businesses there.

However, once you have a leader more worried about his power rather than being beholden to the working class, that is no longer an obstacle.

Re:‘The Trains Are Slower Because They Slowed the Trains Down’ by jbfoo on Wednesday March 14, 2018 @11:00AM (#16585175)
Well, I guess, one could argument than after losing contact with working class and solidifying their rule, China's ruling class will what every non-democratic regime did --- try to expand territoriality. And they have grudges with Taiwan.
Re:‘The Trains Are Slower Because They Slowed the Trains Down’ by mistermann on Saturday March 17, 2018 @02:40PM (#16608354)
How do you know what individuals will do?