I am begging the President not to ruin my portfolio by bringing your jobs back from China

I had to laugh, nearly spilling my Sancerre in the process. The sheer hubris of the working class to demand a disruption to the global supply chain simply because they are having trouble making their mortgage payments is, fundamentally, why we insulate macroeconomic policy from the electorate.

We do not want the President to “win” a trade war. We want the President to smile, shake hands, issue a vaguely worded communique about mutual prosperity, and then get back on the plane without accidentally disrupting the flow of cheap lithium-ion batteries that has kept my portfolio returning a reliable nine percent annually for the better part of a decade.

The structural realities of our arrangement with Beijing are not a bug of the system; they are the entire point of the system. The current paradigm—whereby American corporations offshore their manufacturing to heavily subsidized industrial zones in Guangdong, thereby crushing domestic wage inflation and maximizing quarterly shareholder dividends—is the greatest engine for wealth creation in the history of human civilization.

To jeopardize that delicate ecosystem for the sake of returning a few thousand pension-heavy, unionized manufacturing jobs to the Rust Belt would be an act of unfathomable fiscal vandalism.

Consider the issue of intellectual property theft, a favorite grievance of the populist right. Yes, it is true that Chinese state-backed enterprises routinely appropriate the proprietary technology of American firms. But what the layperson fails to understand is that if you are properly diversified, this is actually a tremendous opportunity.

I own significant shares in the American tech conglomerates whose patents are being infringed upon, but I also possess a robust stake in the emerging market index funds that hold the Chinese companies doing the infringing. I call it the Beijing Straddle. If an American aerospace firm spends three billion dollars in R&D to develop a new drone, and a firm in Shenzhen simply copies the schematics and manufactures it at a tenth of the cost, my emerging market portfolio absorbs the upside of the theft.

Why would I want the President to fly to Beijing and put a stop to this beautiful, frictionless transfer of knowledge? It would be like asking the police to break up a robbery in which you are simultaneously the victim, the getaway driver, and the fence.

The same principle applies to the much-maligned trade deficit. A trade deficit simply means that China is sending us millions of tons of tangible, manufactured goods—televisions, medical equipment, automotive parts—and in exchange, we are sending them digital ones and zeros that the Federal Reserve literally invents out of thin air on a computer in Washington.

It is the greatest arbitrage play of all time. We trade fiat currency for actual physical reality. The only downside is that the people who used to make that physical reality in America are now underemployed and angry. But as I frequently remind my caddie when he attempts to discuss politics on the back nine, you cannot make an omelet without offshoring a few million eggs.

This is why the administration's sabre-rattling ahead of the trip is entirely performative, a theatrical production designed for domestic consumption. The President is not going to China to upend the global order. He is going there because state visits are the geopolitical equivalent of a corporate retreat.

There will be red carpets, military honor guards, and banquets featuring endangered animals prepared by Michelin-starred chefs. The leaders will express mutual respect, air their grievances behind closed doors, and then quietly agree to maintain the status quo because the alternative is a global equities rout that would wipe trillions off the balance sheets of the people who actually fund their political campaigns.

It is entirely possible that the President might secure a minor, cosmetic victory to parade in front of the cameras. Perhaps China will agree to purchase an extra few million tons of American soybeans, a meaningless concession that will allow the administration to claim a historic triumph while doing absolutely nothing to alter the fundamental dynamic of the relationship.

This is the sweet spot of American statecraft. We want the illusion of vigorous defense of the working man, paired with the absolute certainty that the working man will remain entirely exposed to the brutal, unyielding efficiency of the global labor market.

So when you watch the news coverage of the Beijing summit this week, and you see the pundits wringing their hands over whether the President can secure a meaningful structural agreement, I urge you to take a deep breath and look at your brokerage account.

If the President comes home empty-handed, having failed to secure a single meaningful concession on labor standards or industrial subsidies, do not despair. Raise a glass of something expensive. Celebrate the failure. It means the system is working exactly as designed, and your dividends are safe for another fiscal year.

And to those struggling Americans who are disappointed that the trip will not bring their jobs back, I offer the same sensible advice I give to anyone facing structural economic headwinds: you should have simply inherited a diversified portfolio of income-producing assets. The failure to do so is no one's fault but your own.