By the Numbers: Going Low-Tech

Over the past decade, the U.S. has scaled back on high-tech exports to China, even as trade between the countries booms. New numbers from the Council on Foreign Relations show that America now exports relatively less machinery and more crude materials than it did a decade ago, due largely to national-security concerns:

10
Crude-materials exports, as a percentage of total U.S. exports to China, in 1999.

27
Crude-materials exports, as a percentage of total U.S. exports to China, in 2009.

56
Machinery and transport exports, as a percentage of total U.S. exports to China, in 1999.

38
Machinery and transport exports, as a percentage of total U.S. exports to China, in 2009.