This week the Blind Spot’s Leaked Lunch podcast sits down with economist and author George Magnus at Royal China restaurant in Baker Street, London.
George is the former chief economist of Swiss bank UBS and the author of The Age of Aging and Red Flags: Why Xi’s China is in Jeopardy.
Izabella Kaminska chats with George about the future of China, life after banking, productivity challenges for the Western economy and how Taiwan will fare in a new Cold War environment. George also reveals that he doesn’t think we’re heading back to the 1970s though, which is good news for him because he is not a fan of either flares or Abba.
The podcast was recorded on July 6, before US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan on August 2 and the ensuing controversy. In an emailed update, George said that regardless of this, Pelosi’s visit has not altered China’s basic stance towards Taiwan and that the military drills we are now seeing were just waiting for a catalyst like this. Pelosi had a walk-on part in an unfolding geopolitical drama, and the key question now, as he noted in his Unherd column on August 9, is about what China, as the main risk to peace, decides to do next.
