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Mapping the Blast Radius: What Happens When the "World's Factory" Stops?

In global trade, "efficiency" often masks "fragility." We know that China is central to the global electronics supply chain, but how central? And if that node were to go dark, who would feel the shockwaves first?

To answer this, I moved beyond standard trade statistics and built a network simulation using the OECD Inter-Country Input-Output (ICIO) Tables (2023 Edition). This dataset maps the DNA of the global economy, tracking every dollar of input across 66 countries and 45 industries.

1. The Blast Radius: Tracing the Contagion

I treated the global economy as a directed graph and simulated a total supply shock to Chinese Electronics (CHN_C26). By tracing the flow of inputs across three tiers of buyers, I visualized the "Blast Radius" of this disruption.

Fig 1: The Supply Chain Cascade. The shock originates in China (Red) and immediately hits "Tier 1" assembly hubs (Dark Blue) before cascading to global consumers.

The network map reveals a distinct "Hub and Spoke" architecture. The shock doesn't hit everyone equally. It first devastates domestic Chinese sectors (Red nodes) and key international processing hubs like Vietnam and Mexico (Dark Blue nodes). These countries act as "transmission gears," passing the shock downstream to the final consumers in the US and Europe (Light Blue nodes on the far right).

2. The Risk Matrix: Vulnerability vs. Scale

Not all dependencies are created equal. Some industries buy a lot from China but have diversified suppliers. Others are smaller but entirely dependent. I plotted every global industry on a Risk Matrix to identify the critical vulnerabilities.

Fig 2: The Risk Matrix. Industries in the top-right corner (High Value + High Dependence) are "Too Big to Fail."
Key Finding: The data exposes a "Critical Quadrant" of risk. Vietnam Electronics and Mexico Electronics appear in the extreme top-right. They rely on Chinese inputs for >6% of their total production value, making them single points of failure in the global chain.

Conclusion

This analysis confirms that "de-coupling" is mathematically difficult. The network structure shows that even countries appearing "independent" are often just one node removed from the center. The blast radius of a single node is global, instantaneous, and unavoidable.

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