Would somebody please tell Stupid about rare earth minerals and the fact that China owns 97%. [View all]

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Our trade with China is very complex. When Stupid puts on a hefty import tax on aluminium it will raise the cost of everything we make that uses aluminium, like Boeing jets. This will put pressure on sales and profits.

There are dozens of other economic inter relations that we share with China where someone who is an amateur on trade will think is a really good idea but will damage us more than it will China.

One of these areas where we need rare earth minerals for advanced electronics.

One of the advantages of the WTO is that it sets a basic level playing field where trade issues are settled on principle and precedent. Multi lateral institutions have worked very very well for the US. We have own most of the cases we have brought. One of the most important areas is when the Obama administration took China to the WTO and won over China's use of quotas to keep rare earth minerals in China so that advanced manufacturing would have to be done in China. This is the kind of thing that a China First President would do as Stupid would try and do if we owned 97% of rare earth minerals.

If Trump continues his idiotic trade war expect China to hold back rare earth minerals and even threaten to leave the WTO if necessary.

Here is some background on rare earth minerals:

1) Obama administration wins WTO complaint about export quotas for rare earth minerals:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rare_Earths_Trade_Dispute

The Rare Earths Trade Dispute was a trade dispute between China on one side and several countries led by the US on the other. The dispute was over China's export restrictions on rare earth elements, plus Tungsten and Molybdenum, which are used to make many electronics such as smartphones. China controls 97% of the production of these elements. The US, EU and Japan argued that the restrictions were a violation of the WTO trade regulations. In 2012, the Obama administration filed a case with the Dispute Settlement Body of the WTO. In 2014, the WTO ruled against China, which led China to drop the export quotas in 2015.

2) China has a near monopoly on Rare Earth Minerals

The rare earth industry in China is a large industry that is important to Chinese internal economics. The rare earth metals are used to manufacture everything from electric or hybrid vehicles, wind turbines, consumer electronics and other clean energy technologies.[1] Rare earth minerals are a group of minerals containing relatively large amounts of the 17 rare earth elements[2]. They are dispersed in low concentrations and are costly to extract from ore.[3]

China's rare earth industry makes up 97 percent of rare earth trade worldwide.[4][5] It is estimated the world has 99 million tonnes of rare earth reserve deposits.[6] China's reserves are estimated to be 36 million tonnes or roughly 30 percent of the world's total reserves.[6]

3) Where Rare Earth Minerals are needed and the industries that Stupid is about to wipe out in the US. All that is needed to wipe out the companies that use Rare Earth Minerals as essential raw materials is to disrupt shipments for 6-9 months. A dispute with the WTO typically takes about 3-5 years to settle and China could simply walk away from the WTO if there is an escalated trade war.

https://www.thebalance.com/rare-earth-metals-2340169

Rare Earth Metals and Their Applications

In order of increasing atomic mass, the rare earth metals and some of their common applications are given below.
•Scandium: Atomic weight 21. Used to strengthen aluminum alloys.
•Yttrium: Atomic weight 39. Used in superconductors and exotic light sources.
•Lanthanum: Atomic weight 57. Used in specialty glasses and optics, electrodes and for hydrogen storage.
•Cerium: Atomic weight 58. Makes an excellent oxidizer, used in oil cracking during petroleum refining and is used for yellow color in ceramics and glass.
•Praseodymium: Atomic weight 59. Used in magnets, lasers and as green color in ceramics and glass.
•Neodymium: Atomic weight 60. Used in magnets, lasers and as purple color in ceramics and glass.
•Promethium: Atomic weight 61. Used in nuclear batteries.
•Samarium: Atomic weight 62. Used in magnets, lasers and for neutron capture.
•Europium: Atomic weight 63. Makes colored phosphors, lasers, and mercury-vapor lamps.
•Gadolinium: Atomic weight 64. Used in magnets, specialty optics, and computer memory.
•Terbium: Atomic weight 65. Used as green in ceramics and paints, and in lasers and fluorescent lamps.
•Dysprosium: Atomic weight 66. Used in magnets and lasers.
•Holmium: Atomic weight 67. Used in lasers.
•Erbium: Atomic weight 68. Used in steel alloyed with vanadium, as well as in lasers.
•Thulium: Atomic weight 69. Used in portable x-ray equipment.
•Ytterbium: Atomic weight 70. Used in infrared lasers. Also, works as a great chemical reducer.
•Lutetium: Atomic weight 71. Used in specialty glass and radiology equipment.

Stupid isn't going to just wreck havoc in our agricultural exports and high paying manufacturing like airplanes he is about to put us 10 years behind in key future manufacturing like lasers and magnets, and no Stupid we are not talking about magnets for kids but industrial magnets.