Tackling the credit crisis

[rov1200]

With the American economy heading for a deep recession, their unemployment rate currently above 6% and rising exponentially Obama has promised protectionism for its companies and workers. This will obviously mean less imports from China and even Britain.

As Britain is closely linked to American policies should we follow their model and concern ourselves primarily with putting our own economy first?

[jno]

refusing to buy cheap Chinese-made goods is a noble idea - until you have to buy expensive British-made ones instead. Will Brits be prepared to do this? I suspect not.

[Clanad]

I would agree with jno, but add that an unbelievable amount of the funding of our enormous national debt is in the form of bonds purchased by, you guessed it, China. We can't really risk attacking the Chinese economy since it's success has been a major contributor to our governments ability to finance itself...

[rov1200]

I don't know who Obama had in mind when he spoke about protecting US jobs and whether he was trying to drum up jobs before he was elected but I assume as most of the imports come from that region it only leads to one conclusion. European leaders Sarcozy and Brown have had phone conversations with Obama since his election win and he re-iterated to Brown at least he was going to use some form of protectionism.

Brown said afterwards in a news gathering that he is strongly against any form of protectionism and urges others to be of like mind. However if only US jobs are being saved it seems an uneven playing field.

I suppose Obama could issue an ultimatum to the Chinese for a quid pro quo so that exports match more evenly with imports. He obviously has plans of some sort in mind.

[rov1200]

Many say the US is incapable of using protectionism because they believe in a free market. However only recently a �20 billion contract for refuelling tankers awarded to the European country was cancelled. Boeing was asked to re-apply for it. Protectionism?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/sep/11 /boeing.eads