Column: The real cost of America’s reliance on trade with China

For more than two decades, the U.S.-China trading relationship has been at the center of globalization’s story: low-cost goods for American consumers, rapid growth for China and an intricate web of supply chains binding the world’s two largest economies together. The Chinese people — hardworking, innovative and industrious — have been essential partners in that story.

But economic relationships are strategic choices. What once seemed like a path toward shared prosperity has become a structural imbalance that weakens America’s autonomy. It’s time to end our excessive trading reliance on China — not over global tensions or hostility, but for the sake of pragmatism.

This isn’t an argument against global trade or ending relations with China. It’s an argument for better trade. It’s about rein