Beyond the Data: China’s Economy with Leland Miller

In a wide-ranging conversation, Dr. Elizabeth Economy and Leland Miller talk about his experiences running China Beige Book, his insights on the Chinese economy, and conclude with a discussion about the Trump Administration’s trade policy.

Miller discusses the early skepticism surrounding the China Beige Book and the process of transforming it into a valuable tool that gathers data from across the Chinese economy while serving as an independent “check” to the Chinese government. He provides insight into the methodology used, from conducting thousands of surveys within China, to looking at labor, manufacturing, and market data which altogether provide a unique view of the Chinese economy and at times, run against the consensus. The two then transition to a conversation on the Trump Administration, having a nuanced discussion on how tariffs and a reshaping of US trade policy affect both the domestic and global economy. 

Recorded on February 12, 2025.

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS

Leland Miller is the co-founder and CEO of China Beige Book. Before co-founding China Beige Book in 2010, Leland was a capital markets attorney based out of New York and Hong Kong and worked on the deal team at a major investment bank. He holds a law degree from the University of Virginia School of Law, where he was Hardy C. Dillard fellow and editor-in-chief of the International Law Journal; a master’s degree in Chinese History from Oxford University; a BA in European History from Washington & Lee University; and a graduate Chinese language fellowship from Tunghai University (Taiwan). A noted authority on China’s economy and financial system, he is a frequent commentator on media outlets such as CNBC, Bloomberg TV, CNN, and FOX Business, and he has served as guest host of two of the financial world’s top morning news shows, CNBC Squawk Box and Bloomberg Surveillance. His work is featured regularly in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Financial Times, Washington Post and many others.

Elizabeth Economy is the Hargrove Senior Fellow and co-director of the Program on the US, China, and the World at the Hoover Institution. From 2021-2023, she took leave from Hoover to serve as the senior advisor for China to the US secretary of commerce. Before joining Hoover, she was the C.V. Starr Senior Fellow and director, Asia Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. She is the author of four books on China, including most recently The World According to China (Polity, 2021), and the co-editor of two volumes. She serves on the boards of the National Endowment for Democracy and the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations. She is a member of the Aspen Strategy Group and Council on Foreign Relations and serves as a book reviewer for Foreign Affairs.  

FOLLOW OUR GUEST ON SOCIAL MEDIA

• China Beige Book on X: China Beige Book
• Leland Miller on Linkedin: Leland Miller

ABOUT THE SERIES

China Considered with Elizabeth Economy is a Hoover Institution podcast series that features in-depth conversations with leading political figures, scholars, and activists from around the world. The series explores the ideas, events, and forces shaping China’s future and its global relationships, offering high-level expertise, clear-eyed analysis, and valuable insights to demystify China’s evolving dynamics and what they may mean for ordinary citizens and key decision makers across societies, governments, and the private sector.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
[MUSIC]

>> Elizabeth Economy (00:07):
Welcome to China Considered.
I'm Liz Economy, Hargrove, Senior Fellowand Co-Director of the Program on US,
China and the World at the HooverInstitution at Stanford University.
Today I have with me Leland Miller.
Leland is an expert on the Chineseeconomy, on US China relations, and
is the co founder andCEO of China Beige Book,
which I think has become over the past15 years, the Go to guide for anyone who

(00:32):
wants to understand what's going oninside the Chinese economy in real time.
Welcome, Leland.

>> Leland Miller (00:39):
Thanks, Liz.
Glad to be here.

>> Elizabeth Economy (00:41):
Great to have you.
So let's just start with a little bit ofa description of what China Beige Book is
all about.
You began it, I guess, 15 years ago.

>> Leland Miller (00:50):
That's right.

>> Elizabeth Economy (00:50):
You know, it's really, I think, as I said,
the go to guide for people who want toknow how, what's happening, you know,
almost on a daily basis.
I think you do monthly updates at thispoint, but you really have, I think,
a unique resource for people.
Tell us a little bit about why youstarted it and what it's all about.

>> Leland Miller (01:07):
Well, you know, when, when I started this back in 2010,
really, markets weren't asking foranother product on China.
They weren't asking for betterinformation on China to their detriment.
Because I think what the idea was is theysaid, do we believe Chinese statistics?
Maybe not.
Do we think that they're accurate?

(01:28):
No, but directionally they gottabe correct and it's good enough.
It's a black box economy,they're a bunch of Chinese communists,
you're not gonna get the realstory no matter what you do.
So anything is good enough,we don't really need something new.
And interesting,
when we started China Beige Book there wasa lot of pushback on what we were doing.
They said, you know what, it actuallycomplicates the picture for you to tell us

(01:49):
what's really going on because marketsreact to what the official picture is.
So if you're telling uswhat's really happening and
Beijing painting this beautifulpicture something else.
Markets typically, you know,typically react to the official picture,
which is echoed by the World bank andthe IMF and, and a lot of large traders.
And so it might actually hurt usto know what's really going on.

(02:10):
I think that sort of view fell apartas you got into the Xi Jinping era and
the economy slowed down.
You started to have credit crises andcapital outflow, panics and
other things like that.
None of these were foreshadowed bywhat was happening in official data.
No weakness showed somethingwas about to fall off.
A Cliff.
So I think as we got in there,it was about five years in, six years in,
people really started to understandthat you need a check on

(02:33):
what the Chinese government's doing.
You can't just, you know,even if you buy into what they're saying,
I don't think there's anybodyout there who still does.
You know,it's just not enough information.
You're not getting enoughgranular information,
you're not understanding credit trends.
You're not understanding governmentstimulus policies and what they're doing,
fiscal and monetary stimulus,labor market inflation.

(02:54):
You need a broader picture and you needone that reflects something that's
more than just, you know,big state owned firms in tier one cities.
And that's often whatChinese data reflect.
You know,during COVID when we were leaving,
you know, we were with the Chineseeconomy shut down in 2020 and then it
emerged the Chinese government announced2.6, 2.7% GDP growth year on year.

(03:17):
Absolutely impossible, coming offa quarter which the economy shut down.
Now that may have been very true forlike a handful of state owned businesses
in Beijing and Shanghai and Guangdong,but it wasn't true for the Chinese.
So what we wanted to do at China BeigeBook is paint a picture of the entire
economy.
We wanted to go across all the regions,all the key sectors.
We wanted to track state firms and privatefirms, we wanted to track large firms and

(03:39):
small firms.
We wanted to track all the differentdynamics and not just growth, credit,
shadow credit,the labor market, inflation,
all these baskets whichwere really important.
And by that we were able to tellthe story of all the different Chinas and
all the different China's inaggregate tell the story about China.
But what it did was allow us to paint apicture of what's really going on in China

(04:01):
that was divorced from this ideathat China was growing at this
beautiful steady rate or eventually a verysteadily but stable declining rate.
Everything was beautiful.
There were never negative prints.
And I think that when we got intothe Trump years, it became more important,
we got into COVID,it became more important.
And so now I think people utilizeChina Beige Book as a way of

(04:22):
just understanding China.
In addition, official data insteadof official data, it doesn't matter.
They need to know more becausethis is an extremely large and
important bilateral relationship.

>> Elizabeth Economy (04:33):
Right?
So I have to say from the outset,I think I've known you for a long time and
I remember when you started chucking,I thought it was brilliant.
I never thought it was a problem.
I'm all in favor of getting,you know, real data.

>> Leland Miller (04:45):
But you were one of the few ones though,
I'll tell you one of the few,
because the most people we went to said,look, you want to be part of this?
You want to help us on this?
Do you want to have.
And people were like,you can't do it, it's impossible, no.
Very few people actually said,you know, this is doable.
And you know, the small group that wewent forward with said, we maybe we
could do this, maybe we can, butif you can do this, it's a game changer.

>> Elizabeth Economy (05:07):
Totally. >> Leland Miller
I think we were quite lucky.
But, but just say a little bit more about the data that you
actually collect andhow you are still managing to do it.
Because, you know,we've certainly seen over the past,
I'd say three to five years in particular,
a real effort by the Chinese government toconstrain the sort of range of data that

(05:28):
outside experts have access to,even actually people inside China.
So how do you collect your data and
are you still able to get the kind ofdata that you did 15 years ago today?

>> Leland Miller (05:40):
Yeah, we survey thousands and thousands of corporates and
we want to make sure thatit's representative of China.
Like I said, it's not representativeof a key region, a key city,
a key cohort like state firms or,or large firms.
And we survey across Chinato get this information.
We always get the question,how are you still able to continue?
Isn't this sensitive?

(06:01):
Of course there's a sensitivity there.
But I think what we did over time is showthat we are calling balls and strikes.
Regardless of what we are in ourpersonal capacity back home,
at China Beige Book we'recalling balls and strikes.
We're not bulls, we're not bears,we're just calling the data as we see it.
And for a long time, people thought ofus through the bare lens because we were

(06:23):
saying over and over, I mean, way earlyduring the great financial crisis when
things were still high andstill Quite good in 2012 and
some of the succeeding years because ofall the big stimulus, we were saying,
look, the Chinese economy is, here'sall the vulnerabilities, here's what's
happening in the credit markets, here'swhat's happening in terms of loan demand,
here's what's happening in termsof all these other dynamics.

(06:44):
The Chinese economy is headed to much,much, much, much slower.
And it doesn't matter what they do, bestcase scenario, worst case scenario, and
we showed that through our data andexplained why.
But I think for a long time people said,these guys are such bears.
You know, Beijing's out therecalling 8% GDP every single quarter.
And these guys are saying,it's much lower, they must be bears.
But the handful of times where markets gotreally, really worried about China and

(07:07):
you start hearing that China collapsedstuff on CNBC and Bloomberg and, you know,
you started to, to, you know, investorsrushed for the exit, we sat there and
said, look, here's what the data show.
And in August 2015, for instance, when thewhole world was panicked that China was
collapsing, we were the onlyones who would come out and say,
actually, nothing's going on right now.
Our data are about the sameas they were last quarter.

(07:29):
Yes, manufacturing's much worse,the PMI scare people, but
services a little bit better.
And so we told a nuanced story.
So half the time where there'sall these collapse panic,
actually, all the timethere's the collapse panics,
we're out there saying,that's not what's actually happening.
China's not collapsing,it's not going to collapse.
So I think that over time we showed thatwe're truly calling balls and strikes.
Sometimes we're much more bearishthan what the government is showing,

(07:52):
sometimes we're more bullish.
And our data actually recently has beena bit more bullish after being quite a lot
more negative than official data from.
For a while.So it go, it ebbs and flows.
The key here is if you'rethe Chinese government and
you're not acknowledging big weakness,then you're also not able to,
to recognize orat least show real improvements.

(08:14):
You can't show the bounce back.
So if everything's stable.
You never see the downside, butyou never see the upside too.
So sometimes our data are actuallybetter than official data,
sometimes they're worse.
But in any case,we're honest brokers on that.
And I think that there's a, there'sa certain amount of respect for that.

>> Elizabeth Economy (08:28):
That's great. So I want to,
I do want to dig into the dataa little bit, but let's start again.
Because you have such a long time horizonand so much experience looking at
the Chinese economy, let's juststart by looking back a little bit,
maybe eight to 10 years oreven if you want, B.C.
jinping, and just give us a sense of theoverall trajectory of the Chinese economy.

(08:49):
How do you see this economy, you know,developing over the past decade or so?
And you know, we hear a lotabout the middle income trap.
And is China going to be able toescape the middle income trap?
What's your sense for where the Chineseeconomy has been, you know, where it is,
where it's going?

>> Leland Miller (09:06):
Well, I think there's a couple points there.
So the first is the economyis growing very fast, but
it was growing froma relatively small base.
So you saw these improvementsyear after year.
And of course that kind of growthgets harder as you get bigger.
But the other thing was the Chineseeconomy was governed very differently
a decade ago than it is now.
You read the GDP numbers and they'vealways been historically beautiful and

(09:27):
stable.
And the key part of that is anything theChinese government predicted always came
to pass.
And it wasn't because these guysare economic magicians, and
it wasn't because they'reprognosticators of legendary status.
It was because GDP was created in a waythat they would grow at a certain level
organically, let's say it's 5%.

(09:47):
They had a 8% GDP target forthat year or that quarter.
And then they just juicedthe economy through stimulus,
typically through the property sector,by just extending lots and lots of credit.
And then they would hit their target.
So the targets were always hit.
And that was the way the system ran.
Now it was funny becauseChina watching a decade ago

(10:08):
used to be this complete fraud wherepeople who would walk, you know,
run around predicting the GDP thatthe government would predict.
Maybe they got in, you know,maybe they read the Chinese press,
they had contacts at Chinese think tanks.
They knew the number was going tobe forecast before it was released.
They came out to their clients,usually at banks, and said, hey look,
we think China's going to grow at 7.8%.

(10:29):
China would then grow at 7.8% becauseit became the official number.
And everyone walked around the roomhigh fiving themselves, saying, look,
we're really good at this.
And so this was this fraudulentexercise for many years now.
It changed under Xi because eventually Xi,once he got into power,
had his power solidified and got throughsome of the anti corruption stuff,
said this model doesn't work forus anymore.

(10:50):
We can't do this forever or we're going tobe creating enormous vulnerabilities for
the party,much less the economy in the state.
So we need to change this.
We need to slow things down.
And what we've seen in spurts over thelast five years, three years, et cetera,
has been a move away from the idea thatthey need to have high levels of growth,
that the idea is slower, healthier growth.

(11:14):
The social compact the party used to haveof the people was we'll deliver you high
levels of growth andwe're going to make everybody rich.
And eventually that became impossiblebecause the bad debt built up
in the economy andit was changed around 2021 or so.
You saw that in some of the campaigns,cracking down on billionaires and
the tech crackdowns and other things,Common prosperity campaign, et cetera.

(11:38):
They moved away fromthe old social compact too.
We're going to deliver slower,healthier growth and
we're going to distributethe wealth more evenly.
And so the idea here was we're not gonnatarget these extraordinarily high levels
of growth.
We're not going to worry about growth forgrowth's sake quite so much.
There is a little bit ofa political sensitivity there.
But what we're going to do is we'regoing to try to build a stronger China.

(11:58):
And what that's moved over the lastseveral years has been this incredible
emphasis on national security prioritiesinstead of growth for growth's sake.
That's building upa domestic chip ecosystem.
It's supply chain diversification,it's building up the military,
it's all these, it's lessening thereliance on the US dollar payment system
because the entire Chinese economy isin some ways built on the US dollar.

(12:22):
They've got all these vulnerabilitiesthat's what keeps Xi Jinping up at night?
So more and more the economy has beenmoved towards growing at slower rates.
They're not worried about the rate aslong as it doesn't create a problem.
A spiral downward and they're movingtowards a completely economic parent,
different economic paradigm,which is slower, healthier growth,
focus on the national security and try toget the debt under control within limits.

>> Elizabeth Economy (12:46):
Okay, so
I think that takes us nicely into lookingat what's taking place on the ground.
And I'm wondering,you said slower, healthier growth,
but is the securitization of the Chineseeconomy and sort of that effort
to develop a fortress China witha lot more, in some ways autarky.
Right.A lot more, you know,
independence around economicindependence around food and energy,

(13:10):
you know, and technology,is that actually healthier?
It's definitely produced slower growth.
But could you really characterizethat as healthier growth?

>> Leland Miller (13:20):
Not really, most of it it's not.
I think where they, what they,
where they get better grades is the factthat the economy, they talked for how long
about a transition from an investment ledeconomy to a consumption led economy.
They did cut the investment,they just never shifted to consumption.
So they get, they get plaudits forwhat they did on investment, but
they get a failing grade forwhat they did on consumption.

(13:41):
And the property sector,this has been an impossible task.
So Wall Street Journal, we're totally onthe opposite side of Wall Street Journal.
A lot of our other friends who look atwhat's happening in China's property
sector and say it's chaos, it's falling,everything's falling apart.
You know, this shows the bankruptcyof the Chinese communist system.
You know, there's a lot of things thatshow the bankruptcy of the Chinese

(14:01):
communist system.
I don't think this is one of them becausewhat they're trying to do is stage manage
a massive diminution of the propertysector as a growth driver for
China's economy.
So if you have something that'sdriving maybe 25% of growth and
you maybe high single digits,whatever the number might be, you know,
you can start andramp up the, the, you know,
the tightening of credit throughout theproperty sector in the broader economy.

(14:24):
But you can't just do that in a linearpath or the bottom will fall out because
y 60, 70%, whatever it might be,household assets in China are property.
If you just see your property pricesgo down every single month and
a straight line down,you're going to have a problem.
And that's actually what happened Lastfall, I think you got to a low point where
the Chinese government saw consumersentiment falling off a cliff,

(14:46):
investor sentiment falling off a cliff,
corporate sentiment, which we track,is falling off a cliff.
And it had the potential to create thisdoom confidence loop where everything
starts falling, which is why they steppedin with something that wasn't as big
as everyone thought it would be,but it was certainly louder and
it did do a bunch of stuff toset a floor on the economy.
So I think that the idea here is not thatthey have stepped up and done all these

(15:08):
healthy things, the economy,they have moved into the property sector,
which is one of the bigproblems they've had.
This is a multi year, many,many, many year process.
The idea that it's over or almost over,it's a three year process,
it's total nonsense.
They're gonna have to work on this overand over and over and over and over again.
And the way you do it is, you know,you tighten credit, you tighten credit,
you tighten credit.

(15:29):
And then when things are starting to getproblematic, then you have to step in and
what the way we described this, startingin about 2020 or 2021 was, you C the herd,
C the herd C the herd ventilate.
And what that means is they're trying totake out these weak zombie firms inside
the property sector.
You call the herd,you call the herd, call the herd.
But when you get to the flow freezes up,

(15:49):
the stronger industry players are startingto weaken and have real problems.
It looks like property stress canflow outside the property sector,
the broader economy,then you start Step in, you ventilate,
you give more creditaccess to these firms.
But what's been soimpressive about what Beijing has done,
is it then they have not gone back foryears and years and years.
They say they would do something,they tighten up, and then they panic and

(16:11):
they go the other direction.
The property sector story has been foryears and years and years, tight, tight,
tight, ventilate.
But then they go right backto the tightening cycle.
So you can actually seethis on our credit data.
And they, they, they take care ofthe problem and they continue to tighten,
continue to tighten, continue to tighten.
Ventilate a little bit.
Continue to tighten, continue to tighten.
Now, we're in a ventilationcycle right now with property.
It's why it's cyclically bouncing back.

(16:33):
But from a structural standpoint,they're trying to
do this just not in a straight linebecause that would cause potential panic.
So this is an extraordinarilydifficult task to manage.
The fact that they have hadthe wherewithal to continue it despite all
the pain, I think that is actually oneof the facets of healthier growth.

>> Elizabeth Economy (16:52):
Right. And I think, you know,
I took a peek at your most recent data,and
it looks like what you're talkingabout is happening right now.
Right?So housing starts are up,
new borrowing is up, so credit is up.
So I think maybe, as you say,
we're seeing a little bit ofan upward trajectory in the sector.
You know,one thing that occurred to me, though,
is, you know, we've seen President Xi talkabout moving away from the property and

(17:15):
toward, you know,the three news and, you know,
sort of the energy sector with regardto new energy and battery storage.
And a little bit, to my mind, it soundedlike he was getting prepared to repeat
some of the same problems thatthey had with the property sector,
which is to say, you know,go all in an investment, you know,
push local governments to invest in,you know, these new industries.

(17:38):
Is it your sense?
And then you're going to end up with thesame problem that you had in the property
sector, which is a degree of,you know, over capacity,
which you still have inthe property sector.
But do you see that happening again?
Do you see China repeating that?
Or do you think what China's investing innow is ultimately has the potential to be
more productive than the real estatesector, that somehow these investing in

(17:59):
these industries is then goingto gin up the economy further?
So do you see it as a repeat, or
do you see this as somethingfundamentally new and smarter?

>> Leland Miller (18:08):
I think it's both.
I think it's both.
Because clearly what they're doing isthey're throwing a lot of money at
the problem.
You saw that with EVs.
There's a lot of talk abouthow great EVs are in China.
They're fantastic,they're cheap, they're advanced.
That happened because the sector was in a,is, was in a, you know,
protected cocoon for about a decade.
They had consumer subsidies,producer subsidies.

(18:29):
They had,
they built up this massive ecosystem nowthat they sort of liberalize the sector.
You're seeing battery companies and, andEV companies and everyone who supplies
those types of firms, they're all dyingright now because there's a price war.
And so what are they going to do?
They got to find new markets andthey're going outward.
So I think Xi Jinping is comfortable withthe fact that they're throwing this money

(18:49):
because they don't want to be relianton technology inputs from the West.
They also want to dominatethe fourth Industrial revolution,
as is said quite often, which meansthey have to produce this stuff.
They're going to brute force it.
That's the Chinese Communist Party way.
But I think that the problem comesnot from what they're doing, but
where this is leading us.
You know, right now, you know, China hasthe largest trade surplus in history.

(19:13):
They have the largest goodstrade surplus in history.
The bilateral, you know, relationship.
The United States is, is a trilliondollars a year in terms, in terms of the,
the, the trade surplus China has.
It's the mo.
Sorry, the broader, the broadertrade surplus is it a trillion?
Is it a trade.
China is the largestsingle component of that.

(19:34):
So which, what you have rightnow is a dynamic where China has
been a manufacturing powerhouse before.
During COVID it ramped it up,ramped it up,
ramped it up because of a lot ofdynamics of supply chains during COVID.
So the manufacturing sector went likegangbusters throughout COVID and
increased its share.
And now you're at a point whereXi Jinping comes out in 2024 and says,
we're going to double down on our doubledown through something called new quality

(19:57):
productive forces.
And what we're going to do through that iswe're going to have a whole of government
effort to manufacture more,to produce more, to export more, and
especially on advanced technology,we're going to dominate the world on this.
Now, this comes at a time where they'realready dominating the share of global
manufacturing.
If you look at some of the statisticsthat the UN has put out,

(20:18):
that the numbers keep going like this,this causes trade friction.
Now, it's not just becauseTrump is our president.
I think any American president, I think,would have a political reaction to this.
Certainly both parties don't like what'shappening in the trade relationship.
It's happening in the eu.
It's happening Brazil, South Africa,Southeast Asia, all these other places
where Chinese overcapacity threatensto take out domestic indust back home.

(20:41):
So I think that the problem here isnot that Xi Jinping isn't willing to
push forward this manufacturing plan,et cetera, it's that there is a,
that there's going to be a politicalreaction from having doubled down and
doubled down again globally.
And they're just simplynot going to allow for
Chinese EVs to take overall domestic markets.
They're not going to allow Chinese,you know,

(21:03):
legacy chips to flood across the world.
There will be a political reaction.
Some of that will be tariffs, some willbe export controls and other things.
But I think that's where thishas become very problematic.
It's become problematic because there'sgoing to be a political reaction to what
Xi Jinping is doing at home.
And that has just started right now in theearly days of the Trump administration and
with the European Union.

>> Elizabeth Economy (21:22):
Okay, great.
So I want to come backto this in a minute, but
let's just sort of wrap upwith the domestic economy.
So as you're looking at the Chineseeconomy and you see some, some signs,
some positive signs, is the privatesector in China coming back?
I mean, is there a sense, is therea new confidence in the private sector?
Because we'd seen, and
you mentioned sort of the crackdown onbig tech in China a couple of years ago.

(21:47):
You know, we've seen graduallythe private sector recede in China,
which I don't think is anything thatanybody expected, you know, 10 or
15 years ago when youstarted China Beige Book,
we thought that the private sector wasexpanding and the state was receding.
So do we see now a newfound confidencecoming out of the private sector?
And with that, do you anticipate that,you know, multinationals from

(22:09):
the United States and elsewhere will startto come back and start investing in China?
Because another consequenceof Xi Jinping's approach to
the Chinese economy has been, andother issues, you know, of course,
as well, geopolitical tensions has beenthat foreign direct investment in China
has largely dried upover the past few years.
So do you see some knock on effectsthat will actually propel the Chinese

(22:33):
economy even, you know, faster and
more forward as a result of the stepsthat she's been taking more recently?

>> Leland Miller (22:42):
Yeah, I don't think so.
So the issue with private firms is,and this happened pre Covid, but
it really ramped up duringthe days of COVID zero.
Private firms don't wantto invest their future.
You know, we have all these growthmetrics where we track whether,
whether profits are going up in revenueand headline metrics, et cetera.
But the under the rate, under the hoodmetrics are really important.

(23:03):
Are they investing?
Are they hiring, Are they borrowing?
And what we've seen from that for yearsnow from private firms has been very,
very disappointing.
Now there was a little bit of bounce uprecently and we're wondering, you know,
is that part of a trend?
Have things cyclically bottomed andthey're bouncing back up?
It doesn't look like it.
It's unclear though.
But I think the bigger issueis that private firms,

(23:23):
I think look at the horizon andI don't think they like what they see.
They're seeing slowing growth,they're seeing international headwinds,
they're seeing Xi Jinping's pushto centralize everything and
more responsibility on state owned firmsat the disadvantage of private firms.
So I don't think their trendsare particularly healthy or optimistic.

(23:43):
And I don't think private firms in Chinafeel particularly good right now when you
have things that hit the headlines likedeep seek and people get excited about
individual private firms orindividual Chinese technological advances.
And so you do have foreign investor money.
Flood in to big Chinese tech companies andsaying, well, maybe everything's changed.

(24:04):
I don't think thatthat's what's happening.
From a broad perspective,you may have some very,
very sophisticated impressiveChinese technology firms.
You do, and maybe some of thoseare attracting greater inflows.
But I think from a broader perspective, ifyou're looking from outside of China into
China, you're not seeinga particularly appetizing situation.
And part of that's because of what XiJinping is doing at home, cracking down on

(24:26):
foreign firms, absence of rule of law,which has always been the case in China.
All these other, you're, butyou're, trade frictions, etc.
You're not liking that froman investor standpoint.
But if you're a private firm tryingto dodge all this stuff at home,
you're not particularly happy either.
So look, there's, there is the possibilitythat something happens, something
bigger and maybe US-China trade tensionslessen significantly for some reason.

(24:50):
And so the trade, the horizon looksbetter from a trade perspective and
from a geopolitical perspective.
And Xi Jinping does bigger stimulus and
he talks about providingmore to private firms and
actually follows through for the firsttime, and which he says it all the time.
They never do it, they never really do it.
So it's not impossible thatyou see this type of reversal.
I don't think it's happening right now.

(25:11):
I don't think the trends that we're seeingeither domestically in China or, or
outside of China looking inare particularly conducive to having
a positive view on private firms in China.

>> Elizabeth Economy (25:21):
Okay, so that kind of is a good segue into our
discussion of the Three T's,Trump, tariffs, and trade.
[LAUGH] Solet's just spend a minute on the tariffs.
And we saw President Trumpactually follow through
with 10% tariffs across all Chinese goods.

(25:43):
And the Chinese had their countermeasures,some tariffs,
some export controls, a target on Google.
So where do you see this heading?
Is this a movie we've seen before?
Because clearly, obviously,
we saw President Trump begin withthe tariffs in during his first term.
We saw President Biden continue.

(26:04):
He didn't actually lower any ofthe tariffs or take them off completely,
but actually put some new tariffson in particular sectors,
especially around clean tech.
And now we're back at it.
I mean,is this just gonna continue ad nauseam?
Is just this represent just a completelack of creativity on the part of

(26:27):
the United States [LAUGH] in terms of howwe can deal with what is a legitimate
set of issues with regard to ourtrade relationship with China?
What do you see happening here?

>> Leland Miller (26:40):
I think markets as a whole have been flummoxed in the early
days of the Trump administrationbecause they don't know what to expect.
And they took all their lessonsfrom Trump term one and
most of those were the wrong lessons.
So if you look at the way thatthe first administration ran,
they were figuring things out.
Most of the tariff battleswere about getting to a deal.
They were tariffs fornegotiating leverage.

(27:00):
And I think that is why cominginto the second term so
many people were out there sayinghe doesn't really mean this stuff.
He's not gonna really do the big stuff.
It's all to get a deal.
He's not gonna follow through.
And of course, Trump sent a lotof his top emissaries who became
the Commerce Secretary,the Treasury Secretary, and
others out onto financial mediato say those types of things.

(27:21):
They said, this, these are,these are tools for bigger deals.
There's a little bit to, something tothat, but it's, it's, it, it's by and
large wrong.
So I think the way to look at tariffs isthat there are several different reasons
for, for why the Trump administrationwill push tariffs forward.
The smallest of all of them iswhat was happened with Mexico and
Canada, which is they'renegotiating leverage.

(27:41):
So Trump does not necessarily want a longterm battle with, with the Mexico and
Canada.
He has a priority on fentanyl, which is1A and illegal immigration, which is 1B.
He wanted to threaten big tariffs,get the Mexicans and
the Canadians to do certain things.
It's not at all clear whether hecommunicated those to them, clearly, but
he wanted to do certain things andthen call them off.

(28:02):
He wanted to get a success storyhere on Mexico and Canada.
But I think because of the earlyexperience of Mexico and Canada, markets
are reading the wrong lesson into whatthe rest of the term is gonna look like.
There are two otherreasons to have tariffs.
If you're, if you're the Trump White Housetrying to push them forward,
one is to use them to restructureeconomic relationships.

(28:23):
There's a idea that other companies are,other countries are cheating,
that they're being unfair.
There's no reciprocity.
We're hearing that, that,that word a lot now.
And they want to restructureeconomic Relationships, but
also the domestic economy.
So the idea of setting up a tariff walland then cutting tariffs for domestic
manufacturers and bringing back, bringingback more production, you know, rewarding

(28:44):
workers, rewarding taxpayers, et cetera,that's the economic component of this.
The other part of this is they wanttariffs to be paid for, for the, for
tax cuts.
And you can't do that through bilateral,through bilateral tariffs.
You need a broader typeof tariff to apply,
some sort of global tariff tobring in sufficient revenue.
That's where all of this is going.
Now, where, in what order, what sequence?

(29:07):
That's always the big question, becausethere is a plan and there has been a plan,
and the plan is just whatever Trumpdecides he wants to change the plan to
that particular day.
So right now, would anyone have saidthat China would have gotten off
easiest in the early going andmaybe Canada the hardest and the EU next?
That wasn't necessarily the way I heardit was gonna be scripted out, but

(29:27):
that's the way we're going right now.
I think the 10% tariffs on China,for instance, are negligible.
I think they're sort of a best casescenario for China, if you see Mexico,
Canada tariffs, because, yes, theydon't want 10% tariffs on their goods.
But if they can have a 10% tariff andMexico and Canada,
who are the rival producers,have a 25% tariff,

(29:47):
that is going to shift the trade deficiteven larger onto Chinese production.
So we're gonna be buying more from Chinawith a 25% Mexico Canada tariff and
a 10% China tariff.
So I think Beijing right now is saying,I don't know what's going on, but
let's just let this play out.
It's certainly not a worstcase scenario for us.
I think we're gonna move to Europe next.
I think we're talking about the globaltariffs and the latest iteration of that

(30:09):
is this reciprocal tariffwhere they're working on.
But I think that the big takeaway here isthat tariffs are gonna play a much more
fundamental role in the economicstrategy of this administration.
There's this idea that if Trumpsees a 2% fall at the stock market,
he'll get scared off andrun the other direction.
That's not gonna happen this time around.
They have much more desire to pushforward a broader tariff program.

(30:32):
They want to completely change theseinternational relationships bilaterally
and multilaterally.
So I think we're gonna be seeing a lotof this tariff talk going forward.
And I think that one of the lessonsthat I think Trump brought out,
maybe not lessons, maybe his regret fromhis first term is if you listen to so
many of these advisors around him tellinghim, back off, don't go too hard.

(30:52):
He doesn't have to run forreelection again.
I think that he's gonna go harduntil something really, really,
really stops him to push back orhe succeeds in what he wants.

>> Elizabeth Economy (31:01):
So you're actually making these tariffs sound strategic,
as though there's a comprehensive,well thought out plan.
It do you mean to convey that.

>> Leland Miller (31:13):
There is a well thought out plan?
Now you could say the plan isa good one or a bad one and
you could say that let's do.

>> Elizabeth Economy (31:18):
That then let's do that.
Is the plan a good one ora bad one in your opinion?

>> Leland Miller (31:24):
I think if done right this, so I spent a lot of time around
economists andI was presenting on this issue last week.
And every economist in the room is justtearing their hair out saying tariffs
are bad, they'll raise the costs,blah, blah, blah.
Fair, you have to worry about this.
And there are certain things you can'treally do from a sequencing perspective,

(31:44):
like tariff Mexico heavy at the sametime you tariff China heavy,
or you're gonna have enormousinflationary pressure building.
You can't do a universal tariff.
You can do it at a certain level, but
if you do it at more of a levelyou don't have an exemption,
then you're going to alsohave inflationary pressure.
So this could be done wrong.
It could Create inflation.
It could undo everything they want to do.
If you look at this strategically,

(32:04):
then there are a lot of thingsthat this can accomplish.
Mexico and Canada, you, hopefully youget out of this with an agreement,
they're going to, they're going to,they're going to battle again in,
you know, if, probably not a monthfrom now, but certainly into 2026
when USMCA is revised so there'll be moretiffs between the Mexican Canadians,
but for the most part,take that out of there.
Don't, don't have that.
No ruffled feathers as,as, as much as you can.

(32:27):
Look, if you look at China, there needs tobe more of a, of a strategic plan to, how,
how to make sure the supply chains needto be diversified outside of China.
You know, the biggest, the biggest issueright now is not just technology and
all these other issues.
We have flooding, potentially floodingin the United States, either now or
next year or the year after that.
Whether it's EVs orit's batteries or it's legacy chips.

(32:48):
The biggest issue is supply chainsthat are reliant on China and
that they could cut off pharmaceuticals,antibiotics in particular.
As long as you allow leverage overanother country to be able to have these,
you have nothing.
So I think that being smarter,doing much harder,
much more of a push against China interms of supply chain diversification,

(33:09):
using tariffs when necessary,using export controls or
investment restrictions as necessary,I think that is a very thoughtful plan.
And then when you look at the eu,
everyone says,you can't have the fight with the eu.
Look, here's the problem with the eu.
The EU is a bureaucratic mess.
It's anti innovation, has no capitalmarkets, it won't defend itself.
If Trump went at Europe in a way andsaid, here's what we need from you,

(33:33):
I think 2/3 of the Europeans wouldsay thank you, Trump on this.
They'd say, thank you, Trump.
Now, that doesn't mean it'sgoing to be done nicely and
it doesn't mean there's not goingto be ruffled feathers there.
But if you think if the end of thiswas a push to release the fiscal
breaks in the eu, particularly byrolling Germany, you pushed for
weapons to be able to be paid foroutside the restrictions of borrowing.

(33:57):
So you actually could fund yourselfsufficient weaponry to be able to defend
your own continent, you were movingcloser to some sort of capital markets
union where you could actually fundinnovation at the ground level.
In Europe, you could see a Europe two orthree years from now, that's saying,
you know what?
We really don't wanna say thank you,Trump, but, man,
he pushed us to do some things weotherwise wouldn't have been able to do

(34:20):
because Germany's this stodgy bear in themiddle that just sits there with his arms
crossed andwon't let any development happen.
So if you get to that point andthen you have an agreement between the,
between Europe and the United States,can you move to China in concert and say,
here are things we are going to notjust unite on, but actually coordinate?
Whether it's export controls,whether it's investment restrictions,

(34:40):
whether it's inbound investment,whether it's trade,
you have the ability to have a much morepowerful transatlantic relationship if you
get some of this stuffout of the way early on.
And so, look, things will happen in onedirection, and they may be great or
not, but the idea that this is not a planthat can be done if sequenced right and
laid out,there are some strong prospects there.

(35:03):
So we'll have to see what the reality is.
But the theory behind it isn't ascockamamy as a lot of people are trying to
make it out to be.

>> Elizabeth Economy (35:09):
Okay, well,
I'm definitely having you back on toevaluate the, the success of this,
because I have to say, generally,I find you very compelling.
Not sure I'm buying this one right nowas I'm watching everything unfold, but
maybe that's just a lack ofstrategic foresight on my part.
All right, let me just ask you about onemore thing, which is the Panama Canal.

(35:31):
I just can't resist, I mean, is PresidentTrump has come in hot and heavy [LAUGH].
I think it's even within the first twoweeks of his administration talking about
Chinese influence in Panama and
specifically targeting what he seesas control over the Panama Canal.
As far as I know, we have not had anyissue with the transit of our ships and

(35:54):
goods through the Panama Canal to date.
It is true that at bothends of the Panama Canal,
the ports are managed by Hutchinson,which is a Hong Kong private port company.
You know, was this a smart play?
Was, you know, what,what was this all about?
Why Panama?

(36:15):
You know, right from the get go.

>> Leland Miller (36:18):
It's about sort of a Newman Row doctrine.
I think there's a lot of concern in thisadministration and broadly in the national
security community that we are notdoing enough in our near abroad,
we're not doing enough to defend againstChinese influence in South America.
We're not doing enoughto defend waterways.
So I think that Panama Canal always beeninteresting because there's such a heavy
Chinese presence there.
And they do some things.

(36:38):
Is Belt and Road that big a dealwhen some of these countries draw?
Well, it's sending the wrong signal,certainly.
So I think that what there is rightnow is this concerted effort at
the beginning ofthe administration to say, enough,
you know,we're now taking this stuff back again.
Is it done in the nicest way possible?
No.Is it done tenderly?

(36:59):
No, but it's,I think that the message behind it is,
we are worried about our near abroad.
We're worried about Chinesecontrol of strategic waterways.
This is why Greenland is coming to focus.
It's about enough is enough is enoughwith the Chinese doing things in our
hemisphere, and we're going to startpushing back against that as a priority.
So I think what you have tolook at here is a strategy,

(37:21):
you can critique the tactics, butI think the strategy itself is sound in
that we have been too lethargic on pushingback against Chinese influence and
Chinese movements for a long time.
And I think that's where this is going.

>> Elizabeth Economy (37:33):
We could have such a much bigger debate on this.
I, I do think, frankly, that thereare smarter ways to go about this.
We could, you know, join, for example, youknow, the UN Convention on Law of the Sea
and, and therefore have access to thingslike seabed mining, which we now don't and
are allowing the Chinese control.
And we're trying to think about bigplays over the next decade and more.

(37:55):
I think that's what we ought to belooking at rather than talking about
taking over Greenland and Panama Canal,which, by the way [INAUDIBLE].

>> Leland Miller (38:05):
Focus on the street strategy,
I'm not defending some of the tactics,but, yes.

>> Elizabeth Economy (38:08):
Okay, okay, [LAUGH] I mean,
I think we're probably in broad agreementon the overall sense of needing to
compete more effectively against China andwith the Belt and Road, maybe,
yes, as you say,a difference on the nature of the tactics.
So I always end up with a coupleof just quick, quick questions.
And so, number one, andI think you're going to have a great

(38:30):
answer to this one because you'vealready started to talk about this.
If you were sitting in the White Houseright now, and frankly,
I kind of wish you were,what would you advise
President Trump as you're lookingat the US China trade relationship?
What might you suggest he do differentlyor in addition to what he's been doing?

>> Leland Miller (38:50):
I think my biggest advice regarding the trade relationship is
make sure the trade relationship isn'tthe sum total of the US China economic
strategy.
I think we need to look outside of trade.
Now.President Trump is going to do
what President Trump wants on trade andtariffs.
This is something that's, like,
fundamental to the way hethinks about the world.
So steering him away from anytype of things like that,
I think is not particularlya fruitful approach.

(39:12):
But I think that the better way to lookat this and what I have advised this
administration to do, is to try to have amore comprehensive strategy towards China.
I think the reason that we on both sidesof the aisle have failed in the past is
every time somebody pushes one thing, itcomes at the expense of another program.
So if you have a focus on export controls,then something else gets minimized.

(39:34):
You have a focus oninvestment restrictions,
then something else gets minimized.
And so we're trying to hit that target,
and we're trying to hit that targetinstead of coming across and saying,
what do we need to do in order to havea smarter US China economic strategy.
Now, I'm a commissioner onthe US China Commission and
anything I say is not reflective,of course, of what the Commission thinks.
But what we did do last year is have thishearing that I co chaired on key economic

(39:58):
strategies towards China.
China leveling the playing field.
And the idea behind it was we need tothink of a way to figure out where
the vulnerabilities inthe relationship are and
go at those in a concertedways with allies and partners.
Make sure we have thoughtful trade,
make sure we have thoughtful technologycontrols to make sure that we're
not providing the inputs forthe PLA to build an army to kill us.

(40:20):
Let's make sure we haveinvestment restrictions so
that all these funds thatwe refuse to identify and
track as a US Government don't end upflowing to the party, to the military,
to someone else, and going places we don'twant to, to build up Chinese technology,
to build up the Chinese military, tobuild up the party, whatever it might be.
So I think you need some of thesedefensive measures put into place on
trade, on technology, on investment.

(40:42):
At the same time, you need to be worriedabout what's happening back home.
We have enormous supply chainvulnerabilities to China.
And we have a deindustrialized economythat is in really, really bad shape.
We don't have the ability to build shipsanymore, we don't have the ability to
build icebreakers or we don't have theability to build a lot of things anymore.
We need to build up ourmanufacturing prowess here.
And it's not just in the United States,it'll be with allies and

(41:04):
partners in cahoots.
But we need to have an offensive defensiveplan that's an integrated comprehensive
strategy on China.
If we do that, then that means we don'thave to have some sort of, you know,
build ourselves into a crisis.
It means we're not going to have to,you know,
throw every anti China thing againstthe wall and see what sticks.
You figure out what the realvulnerabilities are for the United States,

(41:25):
this relationship, and what opportunitieswe should be taking advantage of.
Focus on those three to five things andthen build out from there and
have an integrated economicsecurity strategy for
the United States that's principally basedon our long term competition with China.
I think that there's a possibilitythe administration moves towards this.
I think there's also a possibility thattariffs end up taking all the oxygen

(41:46):
out of the room, which is why it'sreally important that people with sort
of a nuanced take on keep pushing,keep pushing,
keep pushing for people in charge tobe doing the more sensible thing.

>> Elizabeth Economy (41:56):
So I think that's really terrific.
And I guess in that vein we've seen.
I'm just going to push you a little bit.
We've seen Just over the past week to two,the moves to shutter USAID and
of course, hits on other organizations.
And I sit on the board ofthe National Endowment for Democracy, so
let me put that out there.

(42:16):
But those are organizations thatare kind of frontline proactive in terms
of bolstering US presence on the ground,
whether it could be intechnology training.
But really helping to supportdemocracy across the world.
And in many respects, therefore being,
I think,fundamental to our competition with China.

(42:39):
Is that the kind of thing that we oughtto be thinking about also in terms of
a comprehensive strategy with regard to,to China?
Or do you see those asfundamentally divorced?

>> Leland Miller (42:50):
No, those are important facets of the strategy as well.
I think the problem here is that again,I defend the strategy,
not all the tactics I agree with.
And I think that what's happeningright now are some huge broad strokes,
big headline moves.
And I think the next year or so we'll bewalking back from some of those things.

(43:10):
They're going to look closely at someof the things that USAID funded and
they're going to say, my gosh,we got to get rid of those.
And then they're going to look atother things, say, hey, you know,
that maybe is a pretty good idea.
This is focusing on the Chinese CommunistParty in a way that maybe other think
tanks and the government itself can't do.
So I think it's about getting past thisinitial burst of sort of headline,

(43:31):
you know, politics, and then moving intofiguring out exactly the way that we
need to fund some of these things.
I know very few China experts,you know, in the government or
out right now who think that taking awayall these things is a good idea, but
it's happening as part of a broader sweep.
So the hope is that the bad stuff getsswept away, the good stuff gets retained,

(43:53):
maybe through another mechanism.
But yeah, I think, I think that's right.
This is, again, the strategy makes sense,the tactics need some work, and I think
that's the hope going forward that that's,that's going to be the improvement.

>> Elizabeth Economy (44:04):
Okay, fingers crossed on that.
Just quickly, like, what book orarticle is kind of your favorite that
you would recommend that maybepeople don't really know about?

>> Leland Miller (44:14):
So I have a hard time with this because I spend so
much time on China.
I read a lot less,a lot fewer China books than I used to.
I spent a lot of time reading technicalstuff on semiconductors and quantum and
biotech right now.
But you know, what I advised some of ouryounger analysts to do is go back and
Read some of the classics on Mao andDeng Xiaoping and
see how we got to where we were.

(44:36):
I don't think you can do China policy,even as someone who's entering
the field right now witha lot of technical expertise,
if you don't understandthe Cultural Revolution.
You don't understand the Long March,Cultural Revolution, Great Leap Forward,
and all these important parts of howwe got to where China is right now.
It's also important in understandingXi's mindset, since Xi was purged,
that his family was purged andthen he sort of went through all this.

(44:57):
So, I mean, I usually recommend two books,it might surprise you.
One of them, my favorite biographyof Mao is the Jung Chang book,
sorry, I'm getting my two books confused.
One of them was a ghost, that's byJung Chang, what was that called?

(45:17):
It's about three generationsof women in China.

>> Elizabeth Economy (45:20):
Sure, Wild Swans.

>> Leland Miller (45:21):
Wild Swans, I think that-

>> Elizabeth Economy (45:22):
Absolutely one of my
favorite books as well.

>> Leland Miller (45:24):
My gosh. >> Elizabeth Economy
I thought that's fantastic.
It surprises people that Irecommend that to everybody.
I'm with you on that.
The other is not by Jung Chang,although she did some work on Mao.
I like the Mao book by,was it Li Zhisui, who was Mao's doctor?

>> Elizabeth Economy (45:40):
[LAUGH] That one was-

>> Leland Miller (45:41):
That was a lot of fun.

>> Elizabeth Economy (45:43):
Yes, that was a great read.

>> Leland Miller (45:44):
Now there's a bunch of Mao books and a bunch of Dunn books and
they're all quite good.
But my recommendation would be thatget a couple books that are modern.
I know you put out some great ones in thelast decade or so that people should read.
But in addition to doing the reading onwhat US China relations are right now and
how we got here, go back and readthe fundamental stuff from the 70s and

(46:06):
the 80s and the 90s.
That's really how we got here.
And that would be my recommendation forpeople trying to get in the China field
that maybe didn't have a backgroundin Chinese history originally.

>> Elizabeth Economy (46:16):
All right, I agree.
I think those are two ofmy all time favorite books.
So I'm with you on that last question.
Likelihood that we have anotherNixon Mao moment with Trump and
Xi Jinping with President Trump andPresident Xi.
Do you see a breakthrough inthe relationship in President Trump's
second term?

>> Leland Miller (46:38):
I don't see a Nixon moment.
If you're asking whether we could movetowards a phase two deal, we could.
Because all of this depends onwhat Trump asks from China.
If he's asking to buy commodities,he's asking for a share in TikTok.
He's asking things that are moretransactional in nature.
Beijing will give thatto him in a heartbeat.

(46:58):
They may make him work for it.
But that's absolutely, could be some sortof next, next, you know, separate deal.
If the idea is we're going to movetowards a phase two deal as it
used to be described, which is we're goingto fundamentally force a restructuring of
the Chinese economy, then I don'tthink that we can get there easily
because we're never going to beable to tell China to restructure.
What we could do is we could putthe economic strategies in place via

(47:21):
tariffs and tariff rate quotas,through export controls,
through investment restrictions,through supply chain diversification,
all these other things to makethis restructuring happen,
because we have such leverage inthe economy as the big consumer base.
So I think we can make some of thesestructural things happen if we're willing
to take some pain.
But the idea that we're goingto come to some grand agreement,

(47:42):
I think that Trump could come to a phasetwo deal, but I think there'd be enormous
pressure throughout the rest of the termto say, is that it, Is that good enough?
Are we doing what we need to do?
So I think there'd be enormouspressure for them not to be it.
So I'm not going to saythat there can't be a deal.
I just don't think there could bea Nixon moment, a Nixon-Mao moment.

>> Elizabeth Economy (48:00):
Great, and I agree with you, and
I think you might want to add in,to work with our allies and
partners on this, right?
Because I think you said that at theoutset as well, that this is having them
on- Fundamental, this is- In orderto restructure the Chinese economy.
That's probably too big a job forjust the United States.

>> Leland Miller (48:17):
It's fundamental, and I feel so strongly about this.
If you look at the hearing that I wastalking about economic strategies,
on Xi economic strategies forChina, we had a bunch of panels.
The last panel was completelyon allies and partners and
how to coordinate your strategy.
So you get maximum oomph for your exportcontrols, maximum oomph for your trade and
tariffs, maximum oomph foryour investment restrictions.

(48:40):
It's extremely important.
The tension here is thatmost of our allies and
partners don't want todo what we want to do.
Some of them want to do some of it,some want to do none of it.
So how do we get there withoutcausing some pain in the meantime?
And I think that's the problemthat President Trump is left with.
How do we get,how do we get from A to D and

(49:00):
not go through some problems in B and C?
I think we can, but I think that there'sgoing to be some turbulence in B and C,
so we will visit ittogether someday [LAUGH].

>> Elizabeth Economy (49:10):
[LAUGH] On that note, I can't thank you enough, Leland.
You know, I had in mind sort of narrowdiscussion on Chinese economy and
US China trade relationship, andyou've just, I think, you know,
opened the aperture in somereally fascinating ways.
So thank you for coming on.
And like I said,I'm going to have you back on again so

(49:30):
that we can revisit some of yourpredictions and see where we stand.

>> Leland Miller (49:35):
It's my pleasure.
Happy to do it.

>> Elizabeth Economy (49:37):
If you enjoyed this podcast and want to hear more reasoned
discourse and debate on China, I encourageyou to subscribe to China Considered via
The Hoover Institution YouTube channel orpodcast platform of your choice.
In our next program, I'll be speaking withChris Walker, who is the Vice President
for Studies and Analysis atthe National Endowment for Democracy.
[MUSIC]