Correct the question?

Question

Did I typed the question right?

1)- Was Nixon's foreign policy on China a great mistake?

Answer 1

Did you mean a "grave" mistake?

Answer 2

You typed the question correctly. Nixon made a great mistake, just ask the workers in the steel industry who have lost their jobs, China is flooding the market with cut throat prices in industrial piping. China is holding Billions of American Dollars in reserve, if they decide to flood the market to get even, our Dollar will decrease in value, everyone here will suffer from great economic losses. I wish Nixon stayed home and minded his own business.

Answer 3

A correction and questions: China has about 1/6 of the world population. And just what is an "ovation" to China? Also where did you get the idea that China has always been quiet?

Answer 4

no, you can't ignore a nation that has over 1/3 rd of the world population. China has always been a quiet giant, and it was pretty wise of Nixon to make ovations towards China, anything to open the doors of Isolationism, Communism comes and goes, but China will remain, it's good to be on speaking terms with any giant don't you think?

Answer 5

That greatly depends on your point of view.

Globally minded capitalists will obviously say yes. It gave business owners a new labor pool to produce massive amounts of consumer goods at a relatively low cost.

The Chinese themselves have mixed emotions. The state is now spending massive amounts of money and manpower mining coal and building hydro plants to meet the industrial energy needs. Working conditions in China are worse than they were in pre-Labor America. Ironically, Marxism was supposed to free workers from opressive labor. Many Chinese have left agricultural work in order to find work in the factories. However, employment is not guaranteed and work is sporadic. Company owners however are cleaning up the profits left and right. Not all of the companies in China are state owned. Many, up to a certain size, are semi-private. Some are owned wholly by Chinese investors and some have foreign money backing the factories. (Vietnam also has similar companies.) So some Chinese are making a killing.

The impact on the environment is horrific. Smog and acid rain has increased in China. Air quality is poor. Mining and logging are almost completely unregulated leading to massive deforestation and erosion. Farming soil is being depleated and China's population will soon be unable to feed itself due to both the loss of agricultural quality as well as agricultural labor.

Organized American Labor and US factory workers stood to lose the most. Ironically though, it was Organized Labor that helped contribute to Nixon's decision to open up the Chinese market. Through the 1960s American wages were increasing sharply. As Organized Labor demanded higher and higher wages and benefits for US workers, businesses were forced to raise prices to meet the demands. In order to keep prices low and maximise profits US businesses soon began looking for new a new pool of labor...Hello China!

As US businesses began to relocate, US workers began to move into professions without ties to Labor or became unemployed. Either way it was less money going into the pockets of the Union bosses at places like the Teamsters and ILGWU. The demand for industrial energy and steel then also dropped because we were no longer building using coal generators in factories and no longer buildling massive amounts of machines for those factories. So bye-bye Union dues from the UMWA and Steelworkers Unions as well.

Technology and improvements in industry also have contributed greatly to the change in the US Industrial Economy since the 1970s as well. China's cheap labor and corporate fat-cats cannot be solely blamed.

So again...the question really is a matter of opinion and the opinion changes depending on which perspective you hold.