[joebubna]

There are pros and cons to any complicated issue.

The biggest worry over a trade deficit that I'd have are National Security implications due to the dependance on trade with that county. To explain why that would matter, consider the following:

- Because of the much lower wages and regulatory costs, manufacturing here in the U.S. seems to have been strangled in the last few decades and mostly moved over to China.

- This has caused a shift in the way the U.S. economy works, with cheap parts / goods from China being considered a given and a transition to businesses that depend on those cheap imports.

- Once our economy wholly depends on that overseas manufacturing in China, that gives China large leverage over us because we don't have the factories here in the U.S. anymore to pick up the slack if China stopped trading with us and instead found another buyer for their goods.

- MUCH more importantly though, is the affect this dependance on a foreign nation would have on us if China decided to do things that we find reprehensible in the world. Think about what Russia did with Crimea. Now imagine China doing something similar. With Russia we were able to slap strong economic sanctions on them... but if our economy is strongly intertwined that makes taking any strong stance against that nation extremely difficult. I don't think anyone wants their future and safety dependent on strangers from a different society that have different cultural values.