Americans Less Concerned Over China Economy, But Worried About Security Threats

On April 6-7, Chinese President Xi Jinping will travel to the United States to meet with US President Donald Trump at the Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. On the eve of the meeting between Xi Jinping and Trump, the analytical Pew Research Center conducted a survey on the attitude of the Americans toward China.

Despite Trump's rhetoric during his election campaign, the number of US citizens who view China as an economic threat has decreased. In his analysis for Sputnik, the deputy director of the Institute for Asian and African Studies of the Moscow State University, Andrey Karneev, commented on the issue.

According to the expert, criticism of China — namely accusations that its cheap exports deprive the Americans of jobs and threaten the economic security and prosperity of the United States — was an important part of Donald Trump's pre-election campaign.

Trump made a number of extravagant and contradictory statements about China, as well as his future policy in this direction. He had threatened, for example, that he would impose trade barriers on Chinese goods.

"However, the heat of the election campaign has slowed down, and even those who were fascinated by Trump's populist slogans, perfectly understand that the United States won't be able to survive the trade war with such an economy as the Chinese one," the expert wrote.

"China certainly is able to respond to the strengthening of protectionist policies, as it is the third and fastest growing market for US exports. It is clear that a full-scale trade war between China and the US will bring losses to both countries. It will also threaten American investments in China," he continued.

This tendency has been reflected by the results of a poll conducted by Pew Research Center. The image of China as the leading trading power has improved, with many people believing that cooperation with Beijing will be beneficial to both countries.

In 2012, the US-China trade deficit was considered a problem by 61 percent of Americans; now this figure has dropped to 44 percent. If five years ago, 71 percent of the survey respondents believed that China was to blame for US unemployment, while the poll found out that only 53 percent of respondents think so now.

According to the survey, 44 percent of Americans positively speak about China, while a year ago such an opinion was expressed by only 37 percent of respondents. A more positive opinion about the Asian country is partly attributed to the fact that the perception of China as an economic threat has decreased, Pew Research analysts stated.

"At the same time, many Americans are concerned about China's military activities. A little more than a third of respondents believe that China is the main military threat to the United States," Karneev wrote, referring to the survey.