It seems like in the last few years, the cracks were really starting to show in American dominance. The bungling of the COVID response, the BRI and BRICS chipping away at US trade and currency dominance, the failure of Ukraine to repel Russia, inflation and shortages in the imperial core, etc.
But it seems like many of these cracks have been patched up this year. I’m not sure how much is just propaganda, but economic indicators show that inflation in the US has cooled, unemployment is the lowest and the labor force participation rate is the highest they’ve been in decades (even accounting for underemployment/gig work), and real wages have increased amongst the poorest and richest alike (albeit unequally so).
US energy prices are dropping. US oil production is at an all time high, and the US is refilling its strategic reserves at a lower prices than it released them for. OPEC can’t retaliate without taking a huge hit to their economy.
Infrastructure, historically a big issue for the US, has been looking better as the Biden administration passed several huge spending packages to improve train networks and other things.
Ukraine is losing but the US has only spent a small fraction of what they did in Afghanistan, and they’ve debt trapped Ukraine in the process. The Israel-Palestine conflict has certainly turned sentiment against the US but it hasn’t resulted in any material change in relations.
China’s economy is stumbling; although there’s not a recession per se, unemployment is sky high, consumer confidence has taken a hit, and investment has slowed. Interest rates are about 3.5% in China while they’re about 5% in the US, which means China has less room to perform expansionary monetary policy than the US.
The US seems to have gained ground in trade relations. Several countries have pulled out of the BRI. Countries like Mexico, which for a while had China as their biggest trade partner, once again have the US as their biggest trade partner. FDI in China has slowed. “De-risking” and “friendshoring” have started yielding results. I know in the long run this will also weaken imperialism as it develops the productive forces of countries like India, Mexico, and Vietnam, but it might take a long time; even highly-industrialized countries like Japan, Germany, and south Korea are still subservient to the US.
People have completely forgotten about the US’ shit COVID response, but Chinese citizens still bear resentment towards Xi and the central gov for the zero-COVID policy, and the uncertainty over lockdowns was a contributing factor towards the reduction in investor confidence in China.
So overall, things don’t look too bad for the US, while they’re looking a bit uncertain for the other emerging “poles” like China, Russia, and the Middle East. I suppose the silver lining is that a lot of these gains came at the expense of gutting the economies of “allies” like Europe and south Korea, which means that the US won’t have as much to easily prey on next time.
What are your thoughts?
Money grows on trees in North America, but who waters them? The global periphery.
What is sending shockwaves through the neocolonial financial system that maintains the imperial extraction headed to the US, Canada, Aus, Europe, Japan, & South Korea is not just COVID itself but the lack of confidence inspired by the shock from COVID, the US reaction, the failed Russian sanctions, proxy war between Europe and the US in Ukraine (yes I wrote that correctly), and the failed sanctions waves against China, and there is no turning back.
The US is now locked in a struggle against a development model that is cozying up to Taiwan, occupied Korea, and Europe, and we don’t know what the fuck to do. So we’re lashing out at them to try to hit the snooze button. Kick away Europe’s cheap Russian oil pipelines so they’re hooked on our LNG too.
What would have to be turned back to fix the US economy is the development of poorer countries. What will accelerate the process is the creation of new financial systems, international bodies to replace the function of the IMF, more bilateral agreements and trade (African countries mostly trade with non-African countries 😔), waiting to see the New Development Bank really get into gear or stuff like it.
This series of talks has covered this subject starting before WWII.
Is it over yet? Reports of the death of neoliberalism are once again proliferating. (transcript in body)