China hat im Tarifkrieg eine Armee von Robotern auf seiner Seite – enorme Investitionen in Fabrikgeräte und künstliche Intelligenz verleihen China einen Vorteil in der Automobilherstellung und in anderen Branchen.

From the article

Factories are being automated across China at a breakneck pace. With engineers and electricians tending to fleets of robots, these operations are bringing down the cost of manufacturing while improving quality.

As a result, China’s factories will be able to keep the price of many of its [exports](https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/14/business/china-trade-surplus-trump.html) lower, giving it an advantage in fighting the trade war and President Trump’s high tariffs. China is also facing new trade barriers by the [European Union](https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/30/business/european-union-china-electric-vehicle-tariffs.html) and developing countries ranging from Brazil and India to Turkey and Thailand.

Factories are now more automated in China than in the United States, Germany or Japan. China has more factory robots for every 10,000 manufacturing workers than any other country except South Korea or Singapore, according to the International Federation of Robotics.

China’s automation drive has been guided by government directives and backed with huge investment. And as robots replace workers, automation positions China to continue to dominate mass production even as its labor force ages and becomes less willing to take industrial jobs.

He Liang, founder and chief executive of Yunmu Intelligent Manufacturing, one of China’s top producers of humanoid robots, said China was striving next to turn robotics into an entire new sector of business.

“The expectation for humanoid robots is to create another electric car industry,” he said. “So from this perspective, it is a national strategy.”

50 years ago….

China: invests surplus from global trade into infrastructure and education. Intentionally disappears oligarchs who grow too large for their britches.

USA: let oligarchs pocket all the surplus, financialise the economy, take more and more purchasing power away from workers. Never build infrastructure, pour trillions into wars.

Now:

USA: their goods are so cheap, they must be competing unfairly, they are ripping us off because we don’t produce shit and buy from them, reeeeee.