China Rails Over U.S. Fiscal Crisis, Seeing Its Own Money at Risk

[flamingdem]

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/16/us/politics/china-rails-over-us-fiscal-crisis-seeing-its-own-money-at-risk.html?_r=0
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“This is political blather,” said Edwin M. Truman, an economist and former Treasury Department official. “It is a politically defensive response to the choices China has made.”

That does not mean a brush with default will not have long-term damaging consequences for the United States. Even if China continues to buy Treasury bonds, economists said, it may opt for those with shorter maturities, which would drive up long-term interest rates in the United States, hurting home buyers and owners of small businesses.

The sour taste from the budget impasse will also motivate the Chinese to intensify their efforts to deepen their own debt markets. Already, China has negotiated swaps for its currency, the renminbi, with the European Central Bank and other institutions, a step toward making the currency convertible and, someday, a rival to the dollar and euro.

“This gives them a kick in the pants to do it,” said Kenneth Rogoff, professor of public policy and economics at Harvard and a former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund.

Any decline in the status of the dollar will be gradual, said Mr. Rogoff, who pointed to the erosion of the British pound sterling over several decades as a precedent. But, he said, “memories are long: you do this once, you do this twice, and people start to think.”