The Bald Eagle's guide to Economic (Dis)Integration

President Joe Biden is an experienced man. Serving as vice-president to former-President Barrack Obama, and now getting his shot at running the show, President Biden has seen it all. Now, finally getting out of Batman's shadow, our young (not really, but bear with me) Robin (or should I say... Eagle?) has a test from a familiar foe: China. If you ask me, I'm all for economic integration. This is essentially the process of taking down all initial trading barriers, like tariffs, or quotas, and making free trade popular. It ends up with both countries, hand-in-hand, aligning policies, and saying their vows.

We stand in a day and age where entire countries can be decimated by the push of a button, yet our conflicts are mainly handled by politicians, diplomats, and (funnily enough) economists. Now, when we sit here, eagles taking up fights against yellow stars, we see an evaluation of trade policies. Recent enmity between the two powerhouse nations has led to extreme policies being signed by both sides, with the prospect of trade seeming like a far away concept.

In 2022, in an effort to halt Beijing's scientific and military advancements, the Biden administration unveiled a comprehensive set of export regulations, including a move to block off China from certain semiconductor chips produced anywhere in the world using US techniques. Now, after a ton of long, boring, and quite unproductive negotiations, China’s Ministry of Commerce places export restrictions on key metals for the production of chips. It really is a tit-for-tat scenario. We'll see how this pans out, but it's not looking good for our boys in the red-white-and-blue.