Promise lacked weight
U.S. and China need a better plan
Fears surrounding the supposed “trade war” between the U.S. and China have been swirling for months now. So when Jack Ma, the founder of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, announced Sept. 19 his company would no longer create one million jobs in the U.S., as he had promised in early 2017, the pessimists pounced.
“This promise was on the basis of friendly China-U.S. cooperation and reasonable bilateral trade relations, but the current situation has already destroyed that basis,” Mr. Ma said. “This promise can’t be completed.” commentators claimed.
But what very few people acknowledged is that Mr. Ma’s promise of bringing one million jobs to the U.S. lacked serious weight. At the time of Mr. Ma’s announcement, there were no plans for Alibaba to build factories or fulfillment centers in the U.S. There were no plans for Alibaba to expand into the American heartland.
Instead, Mr. Ma hoped Americans could be persuaded to sell their products through his company’s service to Chinese consumers. He claimed this would create such an economic boom for small U.S. businesses that there would be a scramble to hire workers to accommodate for this new market.
Suffice it to say, this plan was short on detail.
Alibaba did host a flashy two-day conference in Detroit in June 2017, ostensibly a first push toward fulfilling Mr. Ma’s one-million-jobs promise. But little seems to have come of that event other than some glitz and glamorous photos.
So what was lost when Mr. Ma retracted his promise? Not much, it would seem.
Meanwhile, the U.S. economic machine didn’t seem particularly perturbed by the announcement. The stock market continues to hum along, growing at a rate that should please all, and the GDP is on track to grow 3 percent this year.
As for Alibaba? Its stock price is down nearly 22 percent since June.
Mr. Ma says he will be retiring and stepping down as executive chairman of Alibaba next year. Perhaps his successor can come up with a more compelling plan for stimulating fair trade between the U.S. and China, or stabilizing his own company’s stock price.