SHANGHAI ¨C When Chinese President Xi Jinping¡¯s team was considering U.S. stopovers for his state visit to Washington this week, a surprising choice was floated: Detroit. According to the South China Morning Post, China¡¯s little-known role in reviving the city¡¯s economy had it in the running. Unspecified ¡°security concerns¡± knocked it off. Instead, Xi will go to Seattle to see the global tech elite and flaunt China¡¯s influence in that sector.
Too bad it¡¯s too late for Xi to reconsider. A Detroit trip would highlight the benefits of trade with his country. Not every American will like the idea that China has become crucial to the future of what¡¯s no longer really the Motor City. But it¡¯s easy to make the case that Chinese investment plays a significant part in protecting Detroit from something worse: a return to the crumbling urban disaster of recent headlines.
Detroit¡¯s links to China were forged decades ago. As early as 1979, American Motors Co. formed a joint venture to produce Jeeps in China, believing that an opening Chinese market would be a boon to any global auto manufacturer. AMC was a few decades too early, but it had the right idea. In 2009, China supplanted the United States as the world¡¯s largest auto market, and in 2013 it supplanted the U.S. again to become General Motors¡¯ largest market. Meanwhile, as China¡¯s economy slows, automakers continue investing in China, believing projections that by 2020, China¡¯s total auto market will become bigger than the U.S. and the EU combined.
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