But two months into the global financial crisis, things look much grimmer for China. In fact the only recent examples of social unrest in one of the world's main economies have come there, not in the west. Laid-off workers in factories in southern China have staged protests that had to be contained by riot police. There have also been strikes and violent protests by taxi drivers in some cities across the country. The notion that the Chinese economy has so much momentum that it has “decoupled” from the US looks like a myth.
在雷曼兄弟公司(Lehman Brothers)倒閉后的幾周,中國政府中明顯能感覺到一絲最終獲勝的得意。中國官員們公開推測,借錢給美國人、讓他們為行將就木的銀行紓困是否明智。中國對美國的肆意揮霍發出了不滿的嘖嘖聲。有人重新提到了高盛(Goldman Sachs)有關中國經濟規模將在2027年前超過美國的著名預測——或許這一預測會提前變為現實?