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Trade Wars Are Class Wars: How Rising Inequality Distorts the Global Economy and Threatens International Peace - Paperback | Diverse Reads

Trade Wars Are Class Wars: How Rising Inequality Distorts the Global Economy and Threatens International Peace

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Winner of the 2021 Lionel Gelber Prize: A provocative look at how today’s trade conflicts are caused by governments promoting the interests of elites at the expense of workers

“The authors weave a complex tapestry of monetary, fiscal and social policies through history and offer opinions about what went right and what went wrong . . . Worth reading for their insights into the history of trade and finance.”—George Melloan, Wall Street Journal

"This is a very important book."—Martin Wolf, Financial Times

Trade disputes are usually understood as conflicts between countries with competing national interests, but as Matthew C. Klein and Michael Pettis show, they are often the unexpected result of domestic political choices to serve the interests of the rich at the expense of workers and ordinary retirees. Klein and Pettis trace the origins of today’s trade wars to decisions made by politicians and business leaders in China, Europe, and the United States over the past thirty years. Across the world, the rich have prospered while workers can no longer afford to buy what they produce, have lost their jobs, or have been forced into higher levels of debt. In this thought‑provoking challenge to mainstream views, the authors provide a cohesive narrative that shows how the class wars of rising inequality are a threat to the global economy and international peace—and what we can do about it.

Longlisted for the 2020 Financial Times & McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award and named a Best Business Book of 2020 by Strategy + Business

ISBN-13: 9780300261448

Media Type: Paperback

Publisher: Yale University Press

Publication Date: 08-31-2021

Pages: 296

Product Dimensions: 5.00(w) x 7.75(h) x 0.88(d)

Matthew C. Klein is the economics commentator at Barron’s. Michael Pettis is professor of finance at Peking University’s Guanghua School of Management and a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Table of Contents

Preface to the Paperback Edition ix

Acknowledgments xvii

Introduction 1

1 From Adam Smith to Tim Cook: The Transformation of Global Trade 8

2 The Growth of Global Finance 40

3 Saving, Investment, and Imbalances 66

4 From Tiananmen to the Belt and Road: Understanding China's Surplus 101

5 The Fall of the Wall and the Schwarze Null: Understanding Germany's Surplus 131

6 The American Exception: The Exorbitant Burden and the Persistent Deficit 174

Conclusion. To End the Trade Wars, End the Class Wars 221

Notes 233

Index 259