What's 700 billion among friends?

If you think the US stock market has taken a hit... just take a look at China's; now this is a 'house of cards' economy. Down about 50% from last year, the Chinese stock market has not been kind to its investors, but just as many Americans are unsure of how and why we got into this economic crises, most Chinese people are even more bewildered.

China, claiming only a partial capitalist economy, isn't the best place to learn about all investment options we're used to in the west. Most of my students understand that something bad is happening with the world economy, and somehow America is to blame, but without knowing the specifics of why or how.

This isn't to say my students aren't effected, because they are. It's easy to tell which students have money in the stock market these days - they're usually the well dressed, sad looking men with the glazed look in their eyes. I had a student last week, when we were doing a lesson on cause and effect say (in dead seriousness), "I lost 700,000RMB ($100,000) this month as a result of the stock market going down." I was thrilled (because he used the correct grammar), but horrified because that's more money than I'd make here in 5 years! My students understand that this effects them, even if explaining what a sub-prime mortgage is would take half a days work.

But they understand 'the government is giving money'. I don't know how they feel about this, because they always say it with a smile, as if it were a good thing. They might be thinking that the US government will finally ride in on a white horse to save the world economy, or then again they might be thinking that this just proves that our unbridled laissez faire economics are a failure, and that China's pseudo-capitalism is better. Whichever it is, I can almost assure you that most are more worried about how this effects them individually, rather than the economic fall out throughout China, let alone the rest of the world.

Not being an economic super-strategist (I'm an English teacher for crying out loud!), I can't say I have a full grasp on the entirety of the situation. I can make my fair share of speculations, most of them ill-informed to simply wrong. So for now, I guess I can just be happy that all the money I lost this month in China was at the travel agent.