[ti:A Former American Treasury Secretary Talks About US-China Economic Ties] [ar:Mario Ritter] [al:Economics Report] [by:www.51voa.com] [00:00.00]This is the VOA Special English Economics Report. [00:05.16]The world's two biggest economies and their trade ties [00:09.72]are important to global economic progress. [00:13.93]China accounts for nearly half of the world's [00:18.25]economic growth. [00:20.25]Last year,trade between the United States and China [00:25.73]was worth more than five hundred billion dollars. [00:29.96]The two nations share many interests. [00:33.28]But they also differ on many, including trade issues. [00:39.18]American and Chinese policy experts have worked to study [00:44.55]and improve relations between the trading partners. [00:48.94]Recently, former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson [00:54.33]spoke in Washington about his report [00:57.48]on a possible new direction in US-China relations. [01:02.91]Former National Security Advisor Steve Hadley [01:07.50]joined the discussion. [01:09.77]Both men served in the administration of President George W. Bush. [01:16.24]The slowdown in China's economy [01:19.41]was the first issue they discussed. [01:22.01]Members of the Chinese news media also attended. [01:26.97]Chinese officials reported last week that the economy [01:32.49]grew at a rate of seven and six tenths percent [01:36.05]from April to June. [01:38.21]That is China's slowest growth rate in more than three years. [01:43.43]The Chinese economy needs a high growth rate [01:48.51]in order to provide jobs for its huge work force. [01:53.54]The People's Bank of China cut its main interest rate twice in July [01:59.90]to support lending and economic growth. [02:03.60]Mister Paulson said he thinks government measures [02:07.92]to control lending will work over the short term. [02:12.30]HENRY PAULSON: "And so I would be quite surprised [02:15.37]if they don't grow somewhere between seven and a half [02:20.07]or eight percent this year." [02:21.43]But there are important economic issues waiting in the future. [02:25.70]Much of China's economic activity depends on investment [02:30.89]by state-owned and foreign companies. [02:34.39]Mister Hadley said China's economy, [02:38.28]its Gross Domestic Product, or GDP, [02:42.41]depends on investment too much. [02:45.92]STEVE HADLEY: "Almost forty-seven point eight percent [02:49.49]of the GDP is investment. [02:51.90]Consumption is only thirty-three percent. [02:54.21]And one of the things Hank calls for in this paper [02:57.02]is they need to move from investment-based economic growth [03:00.56]to consumption-based economic growth." [03:03.00]Consumer or personal spending accounts [03:07.04]for about two thirds of the economy in the United States. [03:11.37]And that's the VOA Special English Economics Report. [03:16.44]Join us next week for part two of our report on economic ties [03:22.88]between the United States and China. [03:25.48]For transcripts, MP3s and now PDFs of our programs for e-readers, [03:32.80]go to 51voa.com. [03:37.00]And follow us on Facebook, Twitter and iTunes [03:41.96]at VOA Learning English. [03:45.57]You can also find our captioned videos [03:49.04]at the VOA Learning English channel on YouTube. [03:54.15]I'm Mario Ritter.