Reply #37: Heh-heh, thought that might catch your eye. Here's an interesting [View All]

[54anickel]

thought on China - if they start sending money to boost their own consumerism, who's gonna boost ours?

China Plans to Spur Consumption, Eliminate Trade Gap

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000086&sid=ann78ASMBdCs&refer=latin_america

June 7 (Bloomberg) -- China will introduce measures to spur consumer spending to reduce a trade surplus that's fueling tensions with the U.S. and Europe, People's Bank of China Governor Zhou Xiaochuan said.

``We haven't seen much increase in consumption, but rather we saw rapid growth in exports,'' he said at a conference in Beijing. ``This isn't something we want to see. Our policies are to cut the trade surplus to zero if possible. We want to use new policies to increase consumption.''

A pickup in consumer spending on imports would help ease pressure on China to scrap the yuan's decade-old peg to the U.S. dollar and limit inflows of foreign exchange that are hampering monetary policy, Zhou said. He said the central bank won't raise benchmark interest rates ``for the time being.''

snip>

High Savings Rate

Exports rose 32 percent from a year earlier in April, twice as fast as the nation's imports. Retail sales increased 12 percent, which was the smallest gain in more than a year, excluding the distortion to January's data caused by changes in the timing of the Lunar New Year holiday.

Zhou said the nation's savings rate is ``pretty high'' and the government will encourage households to spend more freely. That might be achieved by boosting welfare spending, said Qu Hongbin, an economist at HSBC Holdings Plc in Hong Kong.

``One reason for high household savings is concern about social welfare, pension funds, medical care, education,'' Qu said. Diverting more money to these areas would ``help to address public anxiety over these things,'' he said.

more...

So, who's gonna be our new banker?