- What China's Xi Jinping wants from Europe
This map shows the trade flows between China and the EU.
(CNN) -- When the European Council President Herman Van Rompuy welcomes Xi Jinping to Brussels on Monday, it will be the first time a Chinese president has visited European Union headquarters.
But the trip isn't about making history -- it's about closing business deals with European firms. Xi will be accompanied by more than 200 Chinese business leaders, several of whom signed multi-billion agreements to buy airplanes and cars as the contingent swept through France and Germany on their way to Belgium.
China's ultimate goal on the trip is to reach a wide-ranging trade agreement with the EU. In turn, the EU hopes to persuade China to open its markets to foreigners and attract more direct investment.
The first round of the talks took place in January, but the Chinese seem eager to advance the negotiation much further this time around. Before embarking on the tour, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told the National People's Congress that he hopes to "speed up the negotiation toward the investment agreement."
Here is what the two sides want from the deal:
Balancing trade
More than $588.6 billion worth of goods are traded between the EU and China every year -- $1.6 billion every day, according to the latest data from European Commission. But Europe sells a lot less to the Chinese than it buys from them -- last year, its trade deficit with China was $180 billion.
European investors want to take advantage of China's growing middle class and export more.
More direct investment
Despite the large volume of trade, mutual direct investment is still relatively low, with just over 2% of EU foreign direct investment being in China, according to the European Commission.
For years, European companies sought to benefit from cheap labor by building factories in China, but today that trend is reversing. Chinese investors are now eyeing Eastern Europe and the Mediterranean, where the eurozone crisis has pushed labor costs down and created hunger for foreign investment.
China has announced an ambitious plan to invest $100 billion per year into Eastern European countries by 2015. It opened its first factory -- a Great Wall Motor assembly line -- in Bulgaria in 2012, giving the Chinese automaker duty-free access to the European market.
Fair pricing
Europe's trade relationship with China suffered several setbacks over dumping accusations last year. The EU tried to hit Chinese solar panels producers with high import duties, accusing China of dumping solar panels way below a fair price.
In a tit-for-tat move, China then launched anti-subsidy probe into European wine imports. Although both disputes have now been resolved, only 1% of imports from China are covered by EU's anti-dumping measures.
Removing barriers in China
The EU says that China still imposes way too many barriers on foreign investors, who do not have access to sectors China deems as strategic, including transport, telecommunication and healthcare.
Michał Król of the EU investment think tank ECIPE says this part of a potential trade agreement will be critical: "It is an attempt to establish symmetric market relations -- meaning that European and Chinese firms should have equivalent access to each other's' markets."
How important is EU's trade with China?
China is EU's second biggest trading partner, trailing only behind the U.S. Trade of goods between the two has quadrupled since China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001, reaching nearly $590 billion in 2013.
The EU is China's biggest source of imports and its biggest export destination. European companies are fulfilling Chinese hunger for cars, planes, chemicals and luxury goods, while Europe imports $385 billion worth of textiles, electronics and other goods from China.
2.Obamacare Shows America Suffers From A President Dangerously Disconnected From Reality
Forbes 2014.04.04
The population of the U.S. is 314 million. On the day Obamacare was passed, the estimate of the uninsured was 60 million. So in this context, the supposed 7 million Americans signed up for insurance on the Obamacare Exchanges, even if that is a valid number, and all of those have actually started paying premiums, both of which are highly dubious, does not mean any significant success for Obamacare.
That is especially so since at least 6 million Americans have lost their health insurance due to Obamacare, so far, with more to come once the illegally and arbitrarily delayed employer mandate becomes effective, if it is ever allowed to do so. The estimate based on a new Rand Corporation study is that only 858,000 Americans signed up on the Obamacare Exchanges were previously uninsured. That is barely a dent of just over 1% in the original number of uninsured, from the historic Obamacare program that was supposed to provide “universal” coverage.
Yes, there are other sources of coverage under Obamacare. President Obama told us in his celebratory, hocus pocus, Obamacare address on April Fools’ Day that “more than 3 million young adults have gained insurance under this law by staying on their family’s plan.”
But that number is a publicly documented fabrication. It comes from a 2010 survey by the highly politicized Department of Health and Human Services estimating coverage for 19 to 25 year olds from all sources, including taxpayer financed Medicaid, and private insurance, which includes employer provided insurance and individually purchased plans, not just coverage from their parents’ health insurance, as David Hogberg explained at Spectator.org on April 2.
Moreover, that data is now outdated, as later HHS surveys show that health coverage for 18 to 25 year olds has since declined from 2010, Hogberg adds. That is why HHS has not released any new data on the point for almost two years now.
In addition, Hogberg further demonstrates based on 2012 data from the far less politicized Census Bureau, which breaks out data for Medicaid and employer provided health insurance, that the number of young adults gaining coverage on their parents’ health insurance under Obamacare totals at most 258,000.
In any event, the virtue of this young adult dependency on their parents’ health insurance is greatly exaggerated. That coverage is not free. The parents are paying more for it. Moreover, these young adults are not helpless, with no alternatives for health insurance. They can get their own jobs with employer provided health insurance. Or at least they could if Obama was not President. Or they could buy their own health insurance in the market, with help from their parents, if that is needed and desired. Young adults under 26 are the least in need of health insurance, and have the least trouble getting it. The healthiest population in America, they are targeted under Obamacare as lambs to be fleeced for funds to finance health care for others.
3. Afghans Risk Lives to Vote in First Democratic Election Since 2001
Bloomberg Apr. 5, 2014
Afghans braved threats of violence today to cast ballots in an election that could mark the nation’s first democratic transfer of power since the U.S. ousted the Taliban in 2001.
Polling was extended by an hour as eight candidates compete to succeed President Hamid Karzai, who has delayed signing a pact that’s needed to keep U.S. troops in Afghanistan beyond this year. A German photographer with the Associated Press was shot dead yesterday while covering the campaign, part of violence that threatens to deter both voters and foreign investors.
“The question of who wins is less important than the question of what they can do to restore order once in power,” said Anna Larson, who co-wrote a report on voter perceptions sponsored by Chatham House, a London-based research group. “For Afghans, the true test of these elections is whether they can help secure a peaceful transition, or whether in fact they contribute to future insecurity.”
Front-runners for the presidency are former World Bank economist Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai, ex-foreign minister Zalmai Rassoul and Abdullah Abdullah, the runner up in 2009 who also served as the country’s top diplomat. All have pledged to sign the Bilateral Security Agreement with the U.S.
‘Peaceful Handover’
“This is a pivotal moment after more than a decade of sacrifice and struggle,” U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said in an April 2 statement. “The peaceful handover of power will be just as important as the progress achieved over the past decade in building a stronger, more secure and prosperous Afghanistan.”
Preliminary results will be announced on April 24, according to the Independent Election Commission of Afghanistan, with the final tally scheduled for May 14. As many as 12 million Afghans at home and 8 million living in other nations are eligible to vote.
If no candidate wins more than 50 percent of votes -- a scenario the head of U.S. forces in the country views as probable -- a run-off between the top two candidates would take place around the end of May.
The Taliban will boycott the polls and has vowed to use “all force” to disrupt the process that will be monitored by more than 260,000 people and will cost Asia’s poorest economy and its allies $136 million.
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