On this week’s Facebook Live video, you had lots of questions about the impact of President Donald Trump’s executive order, which among other things, suspended entry of refugees to the United States for 120 days. Also on your mind, what consequences that might have for the global economy.
Nelson Arce asked: “China appears to be volunteering to ‘step up’ to become the new global economy leader. What might that mean for the USA long term?”
Kai Ryssdal: Not just appears to be, they are. Xi Jinping went to the World Economics Council in Davos … and he gave a speech that the president of the United States could have given. Talking about multilateralism, and global trade, and engagement, and all of that stuff. You take that speech, you thrown in the TPP being thrown out by the Trump White House, and yeah, they’re absolutely looking to take that. And here’s the other thing you have to remember, in 30 years plus or minus, China’s going to be the biggest economy in the world, no matter what happens. And so the question we have to think about in this country is, how are we going to feel when that happens, what are we prepared to do if we decide as a country that’s not something we want, and what does it mean in the global sense? Because huge part of what it means to be the biggest economy in the world is not straight-up economic. It’s cultural, with movie exports, it’s technological and it’s political.”
We got a lot of questions about airlines, and how they’re reacting to Friday’s executive order.
Molly Wood: Some airlines, like Emirates, are having trouble staffing flights, because they’re afraid that when their flight attendants come to the U.S., that they might not be able to get in or out. When one market shuts down, when an entire global market shuts down, pulls down the shutters, what happens? There are bound to be gigantic ripple effects.
And finally, to answer a question from Kurt Liestenfeltz: No, Kai Ryssdal is still not eating the whole egg at his sad desk lunch.
Tune in next Monday at 10:30 a.m. Pacific Standard Time to ask Kai and Molly your questions. We usually start out on Kai’s Facebook page, but you can also find the video on Marketplace’s Facebook page.
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