Think the U.S. and China can decouple? Take our quiz.

Since President Donald Trump launched his trade war on China, with tariffs mostly kept in place by President Biden, U.S. leaders have embraced rhetoric and policies meant to sever the United States from Chinese markets, low-cost goods and supply chains. The push to separate the world’s two largest economies is called decoupling; others use the terms “de-risking” or “friendshoring” to mean much the same thing. Will it work? Should Americans want it to? Testing your knowledge by taking our quiz might help you decide.

U.S. export of goods to China increased by a scant 1.2 percent in 2022 — a much smaller year-on-year growth rate than for other U.S. export markets. Trade growth to Canada was up 15 percent and to Mexico 17 percent. Yet the roughly $150 billion in goods shipped to China still represented a record high. Analysts say the weak increase in growth, when compared with other countries, could also be attributed to inflation — that is, mostly on paper.

So, Americans are still selling a lot to China. What is all that stuff, anyway?

If you guessed oilseeds and grain — soybeans, wheat and corn — you would have been right for 2020, 2021 and 2022. In 2022, the sale of oilseeds and grain hit a record high of $25.4 billion, compared with $21.7 billion in 2021. But in 2023, oilseeds and grain got knocked out of the top export spot by fuels, oils and distillation products that jumped to $19.7 billion, compared with $13.5 billion the year before. U.S. agricultural products took a hit in 2023 with China slowing down its purchases.

Not all states equally benefit from trade with China — some do far more than others.

The Lone Star state has regularly been the top exporter of goods to China — some $21.8 billion worth of goods in 2022. At the top of that export list is oil and gas, followed by basic chemicals. China accounted for 5 percent of Texas’s global goods exports in 2022, and 2023 looks to be similar.

But besides selling stuff, the United States is also a huge supplier of services — and China is a key market. Services can include everything from business consulting to financial services, from education to travel services to airfreight and port services.

Yes, all those Chinese students spending money at U.S. schools — tuition, rent, general spending — counts as an American “export” to China. That sector took a hit during the coronavirus pandemic, when travel largely dried up between the two countries. But Chinese students are still the largest category of international students coming to the United States to study. And the states that benefit the most are California, New York and Massachusetts.

So trade with China is still big, despite the country falling behind Mexico and Canada in the ranking of U.S. trading partners. But is all that trade really creating jobs in this country?

The U.S.-China Business Council says California has more jobs supported by exports to China than any other state. California exports everything from industrial machinery to fruits and nuts to pharmaceuticals. Also, California is a big beneficiary of service exports to China. But exports to China also support a large number of agricultural and livestock jobs in the U.S. heartland, including places such as Kansas, Nebraska, North Dakota and South Dakota, as well as Texas.

This analysis, of course, doesn’t even mention the benefits that low-price Chinese goods provide to U.S. consumers.

The U.S. and Chinese economies, the world’s largest and second-largest, are intertwined and interdependent — and destined to remain so for some time. China needs access to America’s vast market for its exports; that might even increase as China looks to send more goods overseas while it struggles with weak domestic demand. Likewise, China remains a critical market for U.S. exports — and this is especially true in the agricultural heartland. China also holds about $1 trillion in U.S. Treasury securities. Talk of trying to decouple or de-link the two is a fallacy. Even if the two economies could be separated, the result would be disastrous for both.

That’s not to say the relationship isn’t changing. It is. Both countries are trying to reduce the risk of overreliance on one another in areas deemed critical to their national security. China is reportedly trying to replace U.S. software with homegrown technology at state-owned companies, as part of President Xi Jinping’s push for self-sufficiency (and a directive called “Delete America”). Mr. Xi also wants to reduce China’s reliance on foreign — especially American — sources of food. Mr. Biden, meanwhile, has restricted the sale of sensitive U.S. technology to China, including advanced computer chips and chipmaking equipment. And U.S. companies are buying less from China, though the true scale of this decline is unclear.

“De-risking” for specific national security concerns is reasonable, as long as it does no more than necessary to limit bona fide security vulnerabilities; U.S. leaders should not use this as an opportunity to wall off the U.S. economy from competition, raising prices for U.S. consumers to benefit narrow groups of domestic companies — and advancing a trade war that would punish U.S. exporters.

American leaders and Americans generally should forget about a complete divorce. It’s impossible. Both sides need each other.