United States Trade Deficit
The U.S. has held a trade deficit starting late in the 1960s. Its trade deficit has been increasing at a large rate since 1997 (See chart) and increased by 49.8 billion dollars between 2005 and 2006, setting a record high of 817.3 billion dollars, up from 767.5 billion dollars the previous year.
The graph indicates that, as Frédéric Bastiat predicted, the deficit slackened during recessions and grew during periods of expansion. Also of note, many economists calculate trade deficits and/or current account deficits as a percentage of GDP. The US last had a trade surplus in 1975. Every year there has been a major reduction in economic growth, it is followed by a reduction in the US trade deficit.
Read more about this topic: Balance Of Trade
Famous quotes containing the words united states, united, states and/or trade:
“On the whole, yes, I would rather be the Chief Justice of the United States, and a quieter life than that which becomes at the White House is more in keeping with the temperament, but when taken into consideration that I go into history as President, and my children and my children’s children are the better placed on account of that fact, I am inclined to think that to be President well compensates one for all the trials and criticisms he has to bear and undergo.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)
“America—rather, the United States—seems to me to be the Jew among the nations. It is resourceful, adaptable, maligned, envied, feared, imposed upon. It is warm-hearted, overfriendly; quick-witted, lavish, colorful; given to extravagant speech and gestures; its people are travelers and wanderers by nature, moving, shifting, restless; swarming in Fords, in ocean liners; craving entertainment; volatile. The schnuckle among the nations of the world.”
—Edna Ferber (1887–1968)
“The traveler to the United States will do well ... to prepare himself for the class-consciousness of the natives. This differs from the already familiar English version in being more extreme and based more firmly on the conviction that the class to which the speaker belongs is inherently superior to all others.”
—John Kenneth Galbraith (b. 1908)
“Teaching your child a trade is better than giving him a thousand ounces of gold.”
—Chinese proverb.