The story most people tell about Chinese affluence is out of date. The picture of the status-buyer snapping up watches and handbags to signal arrival — that person is fading. The data from 2025 points to someone quieter and more deliberate: a family optimizing for health, mobility, and a life that travels well across borders.

The provision that should make Western dealmakers sit up is Article 13. On its face it bans the transfer abroad of goods, technology, services, and data that China prohibits or restricts from export. Standard enough. But look at how it defines transfer.

On the U.S. side, the shift is more visible but harder to read. Trump's instinct on Taiwan is not the bipartisan defense-of-democracy framework that ran from Reagan through Biden.