More on the Wal-Mart virus...

The thing that got me looking into this was Frontline’s excellent program on Wal-Mart’s impact on America. If you haven’t seen it, it is really worth trying to catch. Frontline has a lot of the video and related materials up on their website but, you’ll need a big pipe for the streaming video.

Last year we imported $36 billion of goods from China. We exported only $3 billion and most of what we sent out was raw materials to service China’s production boom. “We export cotton; we bring in clothing,” Smith explained. “We export hides; we bring in shoes. We export scrap metal; we bring back machinery.”

Add it all up and you get a record trade deficit with China that will likely exceed $150 billion this year. “You definitely see the imbalance in trade when you come down to the port,” says Smith.