US claims it is outperforming China are inflated

According to data from the United States, its GDP growth rate for the second quarter reached 12.2 percent, while that of China was 7.9 percent.

Which prompted certain US media outlets to claim that the US had surpassed China in terms of economic growth, and some have even predicted that the US could maintain a higher growth rate than China for the rest of the year.

That comparison might not be that accurate. China as the first major country to get the novel coronavirus largely under control, has kept stable economic growth for 2020 and 2021 except for the first quarter of 2020. In comparison, the US suffered from minus growth for three successive quarters in 2020 and did not turn positive until 2021. If one calculates their growth rate compared with last year, the US' digits of course look more significant.

The US' growth is less impressive if compared with 2019. In that sense, China's growth rate for the two years exceeds 11 percent, while that of US is only about 3 percent.

The fact is that the US still faces economic difficulties. In order to overcome the difficulties, the White House has adopted an almost unprecedented stimulus plan worth $3 trillion in total in the first half year alone, with more to come in the near future.

Yet that stimulus is bringing a heavier burden and greater risks to the US. Currently, the US federal debt has already exceeded 800 percent that of its annual budget, while its debt ceiling, frozen for two years, will soon reach the deadline. The US government faces the risk of debt default in the coming months.

Besides, the stimulus policy is fueling inflation, which is dealing a huge blow to the confidence of US consumers.

Worse, the service sector of the US is not recovering as well as expected, and only one-third of its employees in metropolises have come back to offices to work. All these make its economic growth not that sustainable.

Worse, the US is facing a new wave of the COVID-19 pandemic as the Delta variant is spreading. Southern states such as Florida have a daily rate of new infections that is as high as that of 2020, yet the number of people vaccinated is rising at a rather slow rate.

The US needs to boost its economy in a concrete manner, instead of playing word games and creating the illusion of "winning".

BEIJING NEWS