Why the American Consumer remains cranky.

From Marketplace, I'm Nova Safo and for David Brancaccio.

First, China is sanctioning five American defense contractors in response to the US providing $300 million in military equipment

and training for Taiwan.

Beijing considers the island a breakaway province.

Marketplace's Jennifer Pack has more from Taiwan's capital city, Taipei. Province, And while the US has formal diplomatic ties with Beijing rather than Taipei,

America is still Taiwan's main armed supplier.

Last month, the US approved a sale of $300 million worth of equipment to maintain Taiwan's technical information systems.

Beijing says this arm sale undermines China's sovereignty and security.

China has sanctioned American firms, BAE systems, land and armaments,

Alliant Text Systems Operations, Aerovirament, Viasat, and Data Link Solutions.

Though these sanctions may be largely symbolic since American defense companies are mostly barred from making military sales to China.

In Taipei, I'm Jennifer Pack for Marketplace.

It's beginning to feel a lot like 2019. We've got pre-pandemic levels of

unemployment, GDP growth, and we're much closer to what inflation look like in

the before times. Sentiment among American consumers though is not back to a happy place. Marketplace

as Elizabeth Troval has more. Consumer sentiment about the economy measured by the University of

Michigan is down 30% from 2019.

And economists like Aditi Abave with Bank of America Global Research say it's out of whack

with other indicators.

If you look at these levels of sentiment relative to why they've been in history,

then they would point to do much weaker consumer spending than what we're seeing.

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