President Obama held his first summit with Chinese president Hujintao today. The leaders met in Beijing and promised to cooperate on a wide range of global issues, including the economic recovery. China has a huge vested interest in American economy because it holds almost 25% of all foreign-own US debt. We own the Chinese massive amounts of money. So what would happen if they immediately demanded payment and why haven’t they? Robert Crulwich always has a unique way of explaining things and does so in tonight’s “closer”. 奧巴馬總統和胡錦濤主席今天舉行首次會晤，兩人在北京承諾要在包括經濟復蘇問題等全球事務中廣泛進行合作，中國對美國經濟投入了大量的資金，持有美國四分之一的國債，我們欠中國一大筆錢，那么如果中國硬要我們還錢怎么辦？為什么他們沒這么干？Robert Crulwich擅長闡釋復雜的事情，請看今晚的“走進”專題。

These are kids in Shanxi, China, reading out loud, all together. It’s a kind of reading exercise. But what I want you to notice is what this girl is wearing—notice she is in a coat, zipped up. And so is he. And so is she. Many classrooms—look at the hats here---in Chinese public schools are not heated in winter. Yes it would cost money to put in central heating, but the Chinese government has money. Oddly enough, a lot of that money is in America.這些是中國山西的孩子們，正在一起早讀，朗誦課文，我想說的是，看看這個小女孩的衣服：穿著外套，裹得緊緊的。他也是，她也是。看看教室里戴著的這些帽子，你會發現這些公立學校教室原來沒有供暖。當然，集中供暖需要花錢，但中國政府有的是錢啊。奇怪的是，那些錢大部分都借給美國了。

When the Chinese ship products to the United States, we Americans buy their goods. And we, of course, pay dollars. So China right now is sitting on a big sack of US money which they invested in America. Well let’s say that this Chinese sack of dollars is $1.4 trillion thick. That is a lot of money. 中國人把產品運到美國，賣給我們，我們當然是付給他們美元，也就是中國人現在坐在裝著美元的袋子上。總共有一萬四千億美元，這些錢可不少。

So some Chinese are asking why not take the profits that China has made in America and sell US stocks and bonds and dollars, and turn them into Chinese money so China can fix some problems they’ve got at home. So, if China is going to change a trillion US dollar into Chinese money, that means China is going to sell $1 trillion and buy a huge amount of Chinese money. And moving that much wealth from one nation to the other will lower the value of the US dollar and raise the value of Chinese money. With the unfortunate effect that then anything made in China becomes more expensive in America. If they take 1.4 trillion out of the United States and put it into China, the value of Chinese currency is going to more than double. If it more than doubles, everything we buy from China will be more than twice the price. 那中國人要問了后，為什么不收回利潤把投資美國股市債券的美元，全部換成人民幣，然解決自己國內的問題。如果中國要把一萬億美元換成人民幣那也就意味著要拋售一萬億美元，再買入大量的人民幣。這么多錢在國家間流動，就會使美元貶值。悲劇的是，這樣中國商品在美國的價格就會變貴了。如果讓1.4萬億從美國流入中國，人民幣價格就會翻一倍以上，如果人民幣的價格翻倍，中國商品的價格也就會翻倍。

And when the price of dolls and basketballs and everything goes up here and we buy less, what happens to all those people in China who have jobs making things for America. The Chinese government can’t take risk that, so for the moment they can’t take their money out of America. Not yet. Robert Crulwich, ABC news. 如果玩具娃娃、籃球什么的都漲價了，我們的消費也就少了，那些在中國工廠里給我們生產商品的人去哪找工作呢？中國政府不會冒這個風險，所以現在不會從美國撤資。目前不會。Robert Crulwich, ABC新聞報道。