Essentially, environmental and safety standards, along with mandatory wages, have driven almost every activity that the Chinese can do to China, because they'll do it cheaper. It won't last forever though - Chinese standards are rising, and while there may be a shortage for a short while, if the Chinese don't balance their exports right, the high prices they're forcing will drive other mines to open and destroy any control that they had over the market.

Westerners like to think that we have great environmental standards, but that's only because we export our environmental atrocities elsewhere. There's a large embedded cost in our gadgets, and we ignore it because it makes us uncomfortable.

Yes, the hypocrisy here is just screaming...

The US and/or the WTO could have created trade/tax structures that would have penalized environmentally devastating activities like poor mining practices and removed the incentive to shunt these things to poor countries. This would have also removed the "monopoly" that China is now "exploiting". Crocodiles tears all round...

Edit: typos

As I see it, its not really crocodile tears, but the end result of evolution, becoming the apex predator on our planet, and with a society based on our innate dichotomous nature.

Someone else bears the true costs - example, say some random Chinese factory worker at Foxconn who though is able to survive on meagre wages, is unable to spread his genes since he is not able to find a wife and set up a family - while you reap the rewards and go on to sire a new generation which has the incentive to behave in a similar manner.

I use to be very high falutin about all this thing, thinking some true Marxist society will emerge eventually when capitalism collapses. Now, after looking at all the neuroscience and psychology research that has been done, I'm not so sure if we can ever escape the more primal and insidious parts of our nature.

The US has large amounts of natural resources that are untapped for various reasons; forcing us to purchase these resources from other countries. Sometimes I wonder if the goal is to force others to use/sell up their resources first.

I sure hope so. This is an ideal, long-term strategy. Whenever I hear the "reducing dependence on foreign oil by exploiting ours" argument, I think, "Perfect!". Our resources are not going anywhere, and are there for the taking if ever seriously needed, not just to save a few bucks.

Canada also has significant rare earth deposits, including one of the world's largest deposits of indium in New Brunswick. China has a stranglehold on rare earth production because their labour is cheap and environmental standards are, shall we say "flexible".

If it truly becomes a matter of "national security" you will see those environmental regulations issues evaporate.

Well, your Mountain Pass Mine is reopening this upcoming year. It appears to have passed most of the required regulations already. If they can match their previous output, this single mine alone will be able to supply a substantial fraction of China's current output. China has been tightening supply for a number of years now. While reopening mines is a long term project, we've had 2-5 years to begin reopening mines already (as Mountain Pass's progress shows).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_Pass_rare_earth_mine

It is worth noting, however, that Mountain Pass primarily produces "light" rare earths, while the mines in southern China will remain the predominant source of several "heavy" rare earth metals for several years to come (e.g., dysprosium).

That said, such a nuanced argument appears nowhere in the linked article.