Can China fight Trump’s deflation and prices at the same time?

Dozens of delivery drivers in yellow and blue uniforms have crowded in a snack street in downtown Shanghai, on Standby for their next order. The work was temporary, a lot said, a concert to help repay a debt or fill the gap before a better paid job.

For Chinese workers, financial security is more out of reach than ever. They are stuck in the deflation loop of China. The stubbornly low prices on everything, from eggs to a hot meal, have reduced the benefits that companies make, gnawing at the money that workers earn. Everyone has become tighter with money, lowering prices even more.

A deadly business struggle with the United States is the last thing that someone wanted, in particular political decision-makers who have waded to prevent the drop in prices. This threatens to make things more difficult than for the hundreds of millions of workers from China.

Cao Zhi, 27, left his job at low prices by selling car insurance to reach the Ele.me food delivery platform four years ago in Shanghai. He said he had to work at least an additional hour per day to bring home the same salary he was doing when he started.

He said that many of his friends had experienced a similar erosion of profits.

“I think it’s universal,” said Cao, who tries to repay a car loan that he owes in his hometown in the central province of Shanxi.

The Chinese government has been treated for several years with deflation, the pernicious side effect of a real estate crisis crawling in the economy and geling a great economic activity. The main exception has been manufacturing, where factories do much more than Chinese consumers. These goods, including electronics and clothing, are sent abroad to countries like the United States. Exports represented nearly a third of China’s economic growth last year.