Comparing China now to the US in the past isn’t just a convenient rhetorical trick, it’s arguably causal. While the full, more nuanced story deserves its own piece, the decline of the US’s Rust Belt is definitely directly linked to the rise of China. A fate sealed by political decisions, primarily in the US, to go full ‘free trade,’ which has meant factories leaving Ohio for Henan Province, where people work for less and companies can pollute more. Or as Wall Street called it, “changes in policy, starting in the early 80s, but blossoming in the 90s, have allowed US companies to benefit from global labor and regulatory arbitrage, which has increased both their profits, size, and subsequent influence on labor, industrial, and regulatory policy.”