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Home States of 2012 GOP Candidates Export $21.9 Billion to China

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This article is more than 10 years old.

UPDATE (8/19/11): Among all the wacky things GOP hopefuls have recently said or done comes the wackiest: Newt Gingrich plans to boost his chances in the Republican primaries by chasing the Asian American vote, according to Mother Jones. LOL.

China bashing is a popular pastime in Washington on both sides of the aisle, with the Middle Kingdom, in general, getting the blame for everything from high U.S. jobless rates to higher ice cream prices.

So with the Iowa Straw Poll results just in and Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffett calling the 2012 Republican candidates "pathetic" the other day, it's the perfect time for a quick check on what China

really means to these presidential hopefuls in terms of their home states' relationship with China. (I'll save the Democrats and ice cream for another day.)

One way to measure meaningful relationships is by moolah, as in the amount of money changing hands. In this regard, the GOP candidates' home states collectively raked in $21.9 billion from China in 2010.

In fact, of the 10 candidates who participated in this past weekend's Iowa Straw Poll, every candidate's home state has increased its exports to China by at least 337 percent since 2000. Discounting that some candidates hail from the same state—the 10 candidates are from seven different states—six states grew by 606 percent or more, with one home state even scoring quadruple-digit growth. All seven states count China as one of their top three export markets.*

Texas, the home state of both Gov. Rick Perry and Rep. Ron Paul, benefits most from its relationship with China, logging exports of $10.3 billion. Exports from the state lag only behind those of California ($12.5 billion) and Washington, states without a GOP candidate (yet).

Just to cover all the bases, should former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin join the fray, Alaska exported $932 million to China in 2010. Also-ran Donald Trump's home state of New York sold $3.4 billion worth of stuff to China, primarily waste and scrap.

You can draw your own conclusions, but from where I sit, GOP candidates really don't have much of a leg to stand on when they speak of jobs lost to China, particularly in their own home states. Granted, the correlation between China and U.S. unemployment is an inexact science (read how inexact here and here), but it makes sense to me that it takes a lot of people to make $21.9 billion worth of goods for China to buy.

* China is actually Utah's sixth largest export market, but if you add exports to Hong Kong (which counts in my book) you get $1.5 billion in total exports, making the China/Hong Kong combo-pack Utah's second largest export market.

NOTE: You can have fun with numbers, too, with "US Exports to China by State," a new report from the US-China Business Council. And if you really want to get down and dirty, U.S. to China exports are even broken down by U.S. Congressional District.