October 19, 2009
Ten Million Vehicles
China has joined auto king USA and runner up Japan as only the third nation to produce 10 million vehicles per year. With two full months left to go in 2009, the 10 millionth vehicle produced was a Liberation brand truck made by the First Automobile Works (now called FAW Group) at one its main factories in Changchun, capital of Jilin Province in Manchuria - a center of auto production dating back to 1953. FAW has numerous joint ventures today and makes vehicles of several international brands...
Labels: automobiles, chinese autos, industrial
June 12, 2007
China's defense spending catching up to USA?
So says a headline release from the Scripps Howard News Service sans the question mark. The spin (why haven't we seen this headline on Drudge yet?) is a ridiculous misreport of the latest report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) that watches arms expenditures around the world.
According to the report the USA remains by far the world's biggest war machine with well over half a trillion dollars in annual arms spending. China is actually listed at number four after the UK and France. According to the report the top five military-industrial complexes and their 2006 revenues were: the USA $529 billion (46% of the entire world's weapons spending); the UK $59 billion; France $53 billion; China $50 billion (not even 10% of USA spending); and Japan $44 billion.
The Scripps Howard piece uses the purchasing-power-parity (PPP) equivalent figure for China at $188 billion. But that is specious unless the news services also explains that measured by PPP China is the second largest economy in the world just behind the USA.
If we're going to parse the data, a more revealing measure, provided in the SIPRI report but completely unreported, is military spending on a per capita basis. The USA spends $1,756 for each of its (legal) citizens versus only $37 spent per person by China on its "war" machine.
According to the report the USA remains by far the world's biggest war machine with well over half a trillion dollars in annual arms spending. China is actually listed at number four after the UK and France. According to the report the top five military-industrial complexes and their 2006 revenues were: the USA $529 billion (46% of the entire world's weapons spending); the UK $59 billion; France $53 billion; China $50 billion (not even 10% of USA spending); and Japan $44 billion.
The Scripps Howard piece uses the purchasing-power-parity (PPP) equivalent figure for China at $188 billion. But that is specious unless the news services also explains that measured by PPP China is the second largest economy in the world just behind the USA.
If we're going to parse the data, a more revealing measure, provided in the SIPRI report but completely unreported, is military spending on a per capita basis. The USA spends $1,756 for each of its (legal) citizens versus only $37 spent per person by China on its "war" machine.
Labels: arms, china, defense, industrial, military, spending, u.s., war
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