WASHINGTON (AP) — China’s high-flying economy is starting to lose altitude. The big question is whether the world’s economic superstar will shrink gradually — or so fast that it harms a fragile global economy.
China’s comedown is being engineered by its policymakers. They want to slow expansion just enough to cool inflation without sapping job growth.
It’s a delicate task.
“Nobody can say with any confidence” if they’ll succeed, says Barry Eichengreen, an economics professor at the University of California, Berkeley.
China’s explosive growth remains the envy of developed nations like the United States. It grew faster than any other major economy in the April-June quarter, according to The Associated Press’ latest quarterly Global Economy Tracker. Only Argentina’s much smaller economy matched China’s 9.5 percent annual growth rate.
By contrast, the U.S. economy grew at a 1.3 percent rate in the April-June quarter, before expanding 2.5 percent in the July-September period.
The AP’s Global Economy Tracker monitors economic and financial data in 30 countries representing more than 80 percent of global output.
Economists worry that China’s economy could suffer what they call a “hard landing.” They fear that a sudden plunge in China’s growth would harm the economies of the United States, Europe and small
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