I'm not saying it's the same situation, but few people in the 1970s would have imagined it possible that the USSR, a superpower nation, would have a complete political collapse and cease to exist within the next 20 years.
Yeah, but it's more likely the US will collapse like the USSR than it is for China to collapse. The big reason the USSR collapsed was its economic output couldn't keep up, and it couldn't afford the competition anymore.
China's mostly caught up technologically to the US. It's ahead or pulling ahead in many areas. It's production capacity is way ahead. Without Chinese production propping up the US, US stores would probably feel a lot like late-Soviet stores, with bare shelves and not enough products to satisfy demand.
> Things can change.
Yeah, but it's more likely the US will collapse like the USSR than it is for China to collapse. The big reason the USSR collapsed was its economic output couldn't keep up, and it couldn't afford the competition anymore.
China's mostly caught up technologically to the US. It's ahead or pulling ahead in many areas. It's production capacity is way ahead. Without Chinese production propping up the US, US stores would probably feel a lot like late-Soviet stores, with bare shelves and not enough products to satisfy demand.