Hank Paulson, outgoing chief executive of Goldman Sachs and Treasury secretary-designate, made business trips to 21 countries over the past 12 months, visiting many of them more than once. He has travelled to China about 70 times over the past 15 years. Compare that with the global itinerary of Senator Charles Schumer, the New York legislator who is Mr Paulson’s senior elected representative in Washington: Senator Schumer’s visit to China in March was his first official congressional trip abroad in a career in national politics that began more than one-quarter of a century ago.

The jet-setting financier and the stay-at-home senator are an admittedly extreme pair. No business is more global than Goldman Sachs, while Senator Schumer is a proud homebody who tells reporters that one of the secrets of his political longevity is his determination to stay close to his grassroots supporters. But the contrast between the two also points to a divide in America today that helps to explain the country’s ambivalent response to globalisation: the US business elite has gone global, but the rest of the nation, including much of the political establishment, is lagging behind.