In August, China’s largest job-search site released the results of a survey posed to 200,000 college students, which asked if they prefer foreign companies to domestic state-owned companies, Newsweek reports.

The survey lists the opinion of the students’ top 50 corporations to work for. Only three non-Chinese multinational corporations (Google, Microsoft and Procter & Gamble) made the list, down from 21 foreign firms that made the top 50 in 2009. Newsweek reports that this is “evidence that, particularly since the financial crisis, big Chinese companies are seen as offering less-risky jobs with more growth potential.” Is this the whole story, or does it highlight a rapidly occurring shift in China’s economy?

Hongtak Yau, a worker and student living in Guangzhou China, remarked that foreign companies in China typically offer positions with a very low salary and no benefits that just cannot compete against state-owned enterprises. Yau said that the positions offered by foreign companies used to be “decent enough” but “it’s another story now.”

This change in worker perspective signifies a radical change in the Chinese and world economy. As China’s economy develops, workers are going to continue to demand higher rates of pay and better benefits. This will lead to higher consumption rates in China that could lead to a dramatic shift in the balance of trade between China and the United States.With an increased demand for products in China, Chinese companies will have to rely less on American consumption and more on domestic consumption. Not only will this benefit the Chinese worker and consumer, but Chinese companies will also begin to see the benefits as China develops a larger consumer class.

This could be both good and bad for the United States. As consumption rates in China go up, their ability and desire to export will go down. This will motivate American industries to produce more domestically rather than to continue relying on cheap and abundant Chinese labor; it will simply no longer exist. Furthermore, if China’s consumption grows large enough, Chinese shores could open up to American exports for a change. We could even realize a trade surplus, a signifier of greater production and domestic employment.

Unfortunately, the reality is China now holds a great deal of America’s former wealth. They acquired it for the specific purpose of keeping their currency low relative to the dollar. They essentially bled America of its wealth. Now, even as China moves from a net producer to a net consumer, the foundation to fuel its consumption is already in place. The only way Chinese consumers would have a demand for foreign products is if they are somehow less expensive than those produced domestically. This is unlikely to happen. With consumption and production readily available, China will no longer have use for its American slave-consumers. The value of our dollar will be worthless and Chinese companies will have no reason to take it.

When this inevitable transition finally occurs, America will be left in the dust. We will not only lack the production needed to fuel our own required consumption, but the world to which we are deeply indebted will have no incentive to care. The value of our dollar will be so low that no country will take it. In their eyes, America will have exhausted its use. We will be left to fend for ourselves in the debt-ridden and broken down economic muck we have built.

America must take immediate steps to insure that we will be able to survive when this shift occurs. We must secede from the WTO; we must reverse domestic policies that encourage outsourcing; we must increase domestic savings and investment; we must end unnecessary, internationally unpopular, and expensive wars and military occupations. Our country can be strong again, but we can no longer sit back and assume this will happen naturally. For too long we have built up in our minds that America is innately immune from harm, and will always be a shining beacon to the world. September 11th and the crisis of 2008 opened the eyes of many Americans. American citizens cannot sit back and let our country’s policies destroy us. We must take action.

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