Rebalancing the World Economy: China

A REBALANCED global economy requires America to consume less and save more. That means the world’s three big surplus economies—China, Germany and Japan—will have to save less and spend more. None is under more scrutiny than China, whose vast current-account surplus has been fingered by some as the ultimate cause of the financial crisis. The case against China is exaggerated but a surplus of more than $400 billion in 2008, or 10% of GDP, was clearly too big. Can China right its trade imbalances, and if so, how will it achieve rapid growth in future?

The good news is that the surplus is already shrinking. …