>>29026861
>They need us to buy all the shit
I hate Republicans lacking any understanding of the economy.
I'm going to simplify our economy to only 4 variables, Cash, Commodity(just one), and Supply-Demand.
Imagine the whole of the United States was just a guy named Kevin who buys food every week from his neighbor. His neighbor produces the food, and sells it at a profit, and uses that money to buy better or equivalent food, or to continue operations.
One day Kevin decides,"No more, I'm not gonna buy food from my neighbor, I'm going to the supermarket from now on."
So what happens to the neighbor? Well he still grows food, so he ends up with an excess supply of food. To him, food is now worthless, so he now feels no need to go buy more food. If he did need food, be could just trade directly for it, and cost himself almost nothing. Everyone needs food, and Neighbor is still a supplier of food, even if a major demand partner cut their demand. Hearing about how much food neighbor has, and his lowered costs so he can get his supply out faster, your other neighbor Sharon stops buying food at the market, and starts buying cheaper food from the Neighbor.
This isn't hypothetical, this is just literally what happened. America bought battery materials, heavy metals, and pharmaceuticals from China, we decided "no more china" and now we are suffering from everyone else benefitting from the lower prices, as America, the largest demand partner and thus the largest demand influence over price, is now entirely absent, so that supply is all excess.
From the perspective of a producer, you don't NEED buyers, you NEED to offload your product and at least hit dead neutral. You could do that with one big buyer, thousands of little buyers, or even a deal that involves no money transfer whatsoever. In the case of China, these major, national security central businesses like Battery and EV manufacturers, are completely immune to economic difficulties, state ownership.
