Since talk of China and the yuan is non-stop, we thought it would be good to put the situation in the cleanest, simplest perspective we can, and that's this:

Since the establishment of modern finance, there's never been a country that's so rich (it's the second biggest economy in the world), and so poor (GDP per capita is below Albania).

We've always tolerated protectionism and currency controls for poor countries, which is what China is. And we've never tolerated it for rich, big countries.

Thus the Paradox.

From Wikipedia, here's the 2009 rankings of GDP per capita. Note how many come before China It's obviously changed a bit in the last year, but the basic idea is unchanged.

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1 Luxembourg 78,409

2 Qatar 78,260

3 Norway 51,985

4 Singapore 50,180

5 Brunei 47,930

6 United States 45,934

— Hong Kong 42,653

7 Switzerland 40,484

8 Netherlands 39,877

9 Ireland 38,685

10 Australia 38,663

11 Austria 38,567

12 Canada 37,947

13 Iceland 37,853

14 Kuwait 37,849

15 United Arab Emirates 36,843

16 Sweden 35,951

17 Denmark 35,828

18 Belgium 35,534

19 United Kingdom 34,388

20 Germany 34,388

21 Finland 33,445

22 France 33,434

23 Japan 32,554

24 Republic of China (Taiwan) 31,776

25 Greece 29,839

26 Spain 29,625

27 Italy 29,068

28 Israel 28,581

29 Cyprus 28,504

30 Korea, South 27,938

31 Slovenia 27,470

32 Bahrain 27,214

33 New Zealand 26,670

34 Bahamas, The 25,807

35 Oman 25,635

36 Czech Republic 24,271

37 Seychelles 23,744

38 Malta 23,667

39 Saudi Arabia 23,272

40 Portugal 22,671

41 Barbados 22,272

42 Slovakia 21,245

43 Trinidad and Tobago[4] 19,759

44 Equatorial Guinea[5] 18,573

45 Hungary 18,506

46 Poland 18,050

47 Croatia 17,707

48 Estonia 17,695

49 Antigua and Barbuda 17,308

50 Lithuania 16,529

51 Russia 14,913

52 Argentina 14,525

53 Botswana 14,321

54 Chile 14,316

55 Gabon 14,297

56 Latvia 14,291

57 Lebanon 14,268

58 Malaysia 13,800

59 Mexico 13,609

60 Libya 13,599

61 Saint Kitts and Nevis 13,316

62 Uruguay 13,144

63 Belarus 12,750

64 Mauritius 12,737

65 Turkey 12,466

66 Venezuela 12,184

67 Bulgaria 11,883

68 Romania 11,869

69 Panama 11,776

70 Kazakhstan 11,679

71 Iran 10,939

72 Grenada 10,697

73 Serbia 10,577

74 Costa Rica 10,564

75 Montenegro 10,528

76 Brazil 10,499

— World[6] 10,398

77 South Africa 10,229

78 Dominica 10,218

79 Saint Lucia 10,163

80 Saint Vincent and the Grenadines 10,127

81 Azerbaijan 9,540

82 Macedonia, Republic of 9,183

83 Tunisia 9,154

84 Colombia 9,046

85 Jamaica 8,804

86 Suriname 8,630

87 Peru 8,626

88 Dominican Republic 8,269

89 Thailand 8,051

90 Belize 7,841

91 Ecuador 7,765

92 Bosnia and Herzegovina 7,634

93 El Salvador 7,355

94 Albania 7,169

95 Tonga 7,061

96 Algeria 6,885

97 China, People's Republic of 6,778