A Hack's Analysis of China's Economy

To preface this post: this is my opinion and I am not going to take the time to list any evidence for what I am saying here (blogs, especially unread ones, don't need "sources").

I'll have some time during this coming week to make some more posts of substance.
To answer Leo's question, I don't think that the rate of growth will be significantly slower (depending on your definition of significant) this year than the past few.

But the slowdown in the US and Europe is being felt over here nonetheless. It doesn't seem to have brought on much of the doom and gloom I've been reading in the US press, but it has had an impact.

Also, the declining dollar has hurt the economy over here, as China holds more foreign exchange reserves, mostly dollars, than any other country, so the government's assets have declined in value. The Yuan is linked on a floating peg to the dollar, so inflation has been exacerbated by problems in the US. This has mainly hurt the less well off in China, as staples have increased in price at a quite high rate.

It seems I'm rambling, so to sum it up, I feel that in the short term, the rate of growth will be slightly slowed. This is actually a good thing, as the worry is that it will overheat if it just keeps growing at the present rate, creating a massive bubble and unchecked inflation.

Long term it seems that there are some internal problems (eg, income disparity and environmental problems) that could pose more of a threat to continued economic growth than what I think will turn out to be a short 'recession' in the US.