China's economy is weakening, spurring fear of a global slowdown. The trade war isn't helping

Just about every indicator of economic health in China is down. On top of Apple’s slumping sales here, car sales have plunged for the first time in 20 years. Property sales, housing construction, foreign investment, December imports and exports are all slowing. And the job market has gotten a lot tougher.

Chinese policymakers are struggling to turn around the rapidly weakening economy, the world’s second largest, with growth in 2018 at its lowest rate for 28 years. And the government, showing its alarm, has been censoring bad news about the economy for months.

A raft of bad financial data in recent weeks suggests the turnaround efforts so far have not worked, raising alarm about how bad things might get — especially if the trade war with the United States drags on. China’s economic woes, along with a worrying decline in European manufacturing, have sparked fears of a global slowdown.

This month, the World Bank released an outlook report titled “Darkening Skies” in which it cut its global growth forecast for 2019 to 2.9% from 3% and cited the U.S.-China trade war as a big concern.

Read more: https://www.latimes.com/world/la-fg-china-economy-20190121-story.html