Society

Dear Mr. Trump:

As prominent of a businessman as you are, and your buildings which dot the Manhattan landscape speak to your prominence, your recent bashing of China subtracts from your stature. We surely live in a wonderful world for China to have risen from the communist dead so quickly such that you feel the need to talk this still very poor country down.

The problem, and this explains your firing, is that your musings reveal a shocking lack of knowledge about how rich and poor economies work, the purpose of currencies, and the role of comparative advantage in lifting all economic boats. So that you don’t sue for wrongful termination, let me explain your dismissal.

For one, almost like a broken record, you repeat with great regularity the false assumption that China’s monetary authorities are issuing an artificially weak currency. The mere suggestion reveals that you’ve blatantly talked out of turn.

The largest IPO in the U.S. this year was Detroit auto maker General Motors Co., but Chinese companies grabbed an outsized amount of attention from American investors in 2010.

A record 38 initial public offerings from China-based businesses listed this year in the U.S., raising $4 billion, with slightly more than half of them hitting the market after Labor Day, according to data from Dealogic. Last week's IPO from information-technology outsourcing services firm iSoftStone Holdings Ltd. was the last of the bunch; the IPO market is on a winter break until January. Bankers expect another busy year for offerings from China in 2011.

The average amount raised by Chinese offerings this year was minuscule compared with GM's $23.1 billion common- and preferred-stock deal in November, and the number of Chinese offerings made up only a quarter of the total U.S. IPO market in 2010. But when it came to first-day performances, they were whoppers. The best pop of the year came from Internet television company Youku.com Inc., which rose 161% on its first day of trading this month. That was the best debut since Baidu, also Chinese, jumped 354% in 2005. Second-best of the year was ChinaCache International Holdings Ltd., an Internet content and application delivery provider, which gained 95% on its first day in October.

China's capital is weighing new restrictions on car use aimed at curbing the increasingly severe traffic congestion born of China's growing love affair with the automobile.

Gridlock-fighting measures being considered include fees for drivers to use certain congested roads and a system that would bar vehicles from some roads during peak traffic times, depending on whether the final digit of their license plates is an odd or even number, according to a proposal posted for public comment Monday on the Beijing Municipal Commission of Transport's website.

The commission also pledged to build more freeways, subways and parking structures, including park-and-ride facilities. And it recommended raising parking fees and called on residents to work more from home and to use bicycles more—an effort to reverse the near disappearance of pedaled transport over the past decade as car use has exploded in the capital.

The measures could change or be eliminated before any new rules are made final. Monday's document left vague many details, including timing, and the committee didn't respond to a request to comment.

China's premier is making his first visit to India in five years, trying to stabilize a crucial relationship as New Delhi forges closer defense and commercial ties with the U.S. and several Asian countries, who in turn are anxious to contain Beijing's growing clout across the Asia-Pacific region.

Wen Jiabao is scheduled to arrive in New Delhi on Wednesday with about 400 business leaders—one of the largest Chinese trade delegations ever to visit India—on a visit that China hopes will refocus relations on commerce and allow the first Chinese bank to operate in India.

Beijing is keen to bring more stability to the relationship following a string of disputes in the past two years over border issues, visas, water and China's close ties with Pakistan, India's regional rival.

The concern for China now is that India—with the region's third-biggest economy, and second-biggest armed forces—is being drawn into a loose strategic alliance with the U.S. and its Asian partners to counterbalance Beijing's growing economic and military might.