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Nofsdad
Joined: 06 Jul 2003
Posts: 7077
Location: Central CA
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Posted: Fri Feb 11, 2005 9:03 am Post subject: U.S. Trade Deficit Hits All-Time High
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See what happens when your company no longer manufactures anything to trade? Another economic achievement worth noting:
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=1390
Yes, it's from the Michael Moore website but note that it's just a plain old ordinary Associated Press news story by an AP writer.
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| WASHINGTON - The U.S. trade deficit ballooned to an all-time high of $617.7 billion last year, pushed by soaring oil prices and Americans' insatiable appetite for everything foreign, from cars to toys and food. |
Generalizations again. A lot of Americans can't afford to have insatiable appetites for "everything foreign". The insatiable appetites involved are those the Wall Street vultures have for the money they pocket by forcing dependence on cheap assed foreign goods onto the American public. Remember who China's 9th largest tradng company is? Hint: It's not a country, it's an American corporation.
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| The Commerce Department reported Thursday that the 2004 imbalance rose 24.4 percent from the previous year and marked the third year in a row that the deficit had set a record. The imbalance with China swelled by 30.5 percent to $162 billion, the highest ever with any country. |
Those zany Amrican retailers. They sure are a bunch of cutups.
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| Democrats said the figures were evidence that President Bush's policy of seeking trade deals was not working. They said the 2.7 million manufacturing jobs the United States has lost over the past four years reflect in large part unfair trading practices by China and other countries. |
What 2.7 million manufacturing jobs? That whole outsourcing thing is nothing but a liberal myth. We haven't lost any jobs over the last four years.
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| Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., said the imbalance with China showed the need for his legislation that would impose across-the-board tariffs of 27.5 percent on Chinese products unless Beijing stopped tightly linking its currency, the yuan, to the U.S. dollar. American manufacturers says this policy has undervalued the yuan by as much as 40 percent, giving Chinese companies a huge competitive advantage. |
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| Treasury Secretary John Snow told Congress on Thursday that he believed the administration's efforts to prod China to develop a more flexible currency system were bearing results. |
What a crock of rabbit balls!! Sure John, that's why we've had record deficits for the last three years running. What audience are you flinging that load at?
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| The demand for foreign goods was led by a 35.7 percent surge in foreign petroleum imports, which climbed to a record $180.7 billion. The increase reflected not only higher demand but also surging prices. For the whole year, the average per barrel price for imported crude was $34.47, compared with $26.98 in 2003. |
Sure glad we straightened out all that crap in the Middle East and got those oil prices under control. That'll teach those OPEC bandits they can't hold US up!
And it goes on and on. $110 billion deficit with the EU, $75.2 billion deficit with Japan, $65.8 billion with Canada. And then this one which I deliberately saved for last. I grew up in a USA that was considered the breadbasket of the world. We took care of our own agriculturally and had enough left over to export in quantities that offset imports of all other goods. What do we have now?
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| U.S. exports of food products reached a record $56.3 billion. But because U.S. shipments abroad were lower than imports, the country recorded a $5.9 billion deficit in food. It was the third straight annual deficit in agriculture, which had been an important source for helping narrow the deficit in manufactured goods. |
But our economy is doing just great. Nothing to worry about here folks. Our future is in great hands. Uh huh. Right.
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CCCs
Joined: 07 Jul 2003
Posts: 762
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Posted: Sat Feb 12, 2005 5:29 am Post subject:
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The United States does run a huge bilateral trade deficit with China, in the neighborhood of $160 billion last year, but the Chinese did not just stuff those dollars under a mattress. Those dollars came back to the United States, mostly to buy U.S. Treasury bills, which puts downward pressure on U.S. interest rates, delivering more affordable capital for businesses and lower mortgage payments for households.
Tens of millions of American households can use the savings from lower mortgage payments to buy lots of useful products made in China—clothing, shoes, toys, household electronics and other consumer goods aimed at discount shoppers. Last year total imports from China reached nearly $200 billion, but at the same time Americans were producing $11.7 trillion in gross domestic product. There is nothing alarming in the fact that we spent less than 2 percent of our GDP last year on products made by the one-fifth of mankind that lives in China. |
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| Trade with China delivers tangible benefits to tens of millions of Americans through lower interest rates on their loans and lower prices at the store. The number of Americans adversely affected by that trade is surprisingly small, limited to a few industrial sectors that have been in decline for decades. |
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| From 1989 to 2003, the volume of manufacturing output in U.S. factories rose by more than 50 percent. The number of workers employed in manufacturing fell by a net 3 million during that period, but that was because of soaring productivity, not displaced production. In fact, manufacturing employment in China itself has also been falling for that very same reason. |
The Protectionist Dragon
Like it or not, we are living in a global economy. Some things are better and some things are worse.
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Nofsdad
Joined: 06 Jul 2003
Posts: 7077
Location: Central CA
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Posted: Sat Feb 12, 2005 7:43 am Post subject:
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| Like it or not, we are living in a global economy. Some things are better and some things are worse. |
Somehow I knew you were gonna show up with something like that. I just didn't expect that level of arrogance and condescension.
Like it or not, I don't like it. There are the figures. We buy more than we sell, we consume more than we produce and China has become the leading economic power in your global economy partly BECAUSE their currency is linked so tightly with the dollar. If you like that situation more power to you. That's not something we older types who remember when it was different take lightly.
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CCCs
Joined: 07 Jul 2003
Posts: 762
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Posted: Sun Feb 13, 2005 3:12 am Post subject:
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| We buy more than we sell, we consume more than we produce and China has become the leading economic power in your global economy |
Ok, not so fast. China's economy may be growing at a faster rate that ours, but that would be expected based on where they are in the state of development of their country. But they are no where near the leading economic power in the world.
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| GDP is the most important current measure of our Nation's economic performance. Estimated quarterly by the BEA, GDP is a measure of the total market value of all final goods and services produced in our country during any quarter or year. GDP equals total consumer spending, business investment, and government spending and investment, plus the value of exports, minus the value of imports. |
Definition of Gross Domestic Product
For 2004, the GDP for the United States is estimated to be about 11.8 trillion dollars.
Meanwhile, the GDP for China is estimated to be 1.65 trillion dollars.
So by my estimation, the economy of the United States is about 7 times larger than the economy of China. GDP in the U.S. is currently growing at about 3.1 percent while GDP in China is rapidly growing at about 9 percent.
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| If you like that situation more power to you. |
What I do like is that fact that my new mortgage was in the 5 percent range, not 10 or even 15 percent, so I could afford a lot more house. And even though I am not a rich man, my house is full of products my parents would have never have imagined owning (or have ever been able to afford). I have been able to do this while working a retail job. However, I realize that the economy is very dynamic, and change is always just around the corner. I am always looking for that next opportunity, because I know not to expect any loyalty from my employer. Especially in retail, which has not been a true career opportunity for a number of years. Life is what you make of it. Don't let them make you miserable.
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Nofsdad
Joined: 06 Jul 2003
Posts: 7077
Location: Central CA
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Posted: Sun Feb 13, 2005 4:24 am Post subject:
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Got me. I screwed up when I said they had already done it when I should have said they will do it.. That's my mistake and I acknowledge it.
We could play this stupid game forever. In fact I went around the world online reading articles to the effect that China is expected by "global" economists to surpass the US as an economic power by 2020-2025. This would seem to fit in pretty closely with your own assertion that the rate of growth for China's GNP is about three times that of ours. That 7 times advantage we have today has eventually got to bow to a growth rate that's three times ours.
They also state that loosening the knot between the dollar and the yuan would possibly slow but not stop the trends that point toward their above assertion. The same would apply to protectionist tarriffs and trade penalties which you are trying very hard to accuse me of favoring with your "protectionist dragon" cites..
Get this once and for all because I've decided not to play the game anymore.
My beef is with the short sighted quick buck policies that will, according to the very people monitoring and promoting your global economy, allow China to become the economic super power of the 21st century at the expense of the United States. I don't like the idea of this country becoming dependent on foreign interests for even basic commodities. Trade deficits are not... and never will be a good thing..
We've already seen what happens when you can't control the quantity of essential commodities in the damned oil price gouges that have been going on since the 70s. If you're willing to put this country at the mercy of every third world banana republic that ever nursed a grudge against us for a few percentage points in your interest rate that's great. Most of the people I know can't afford a mortgage anyway. I don't buy it and I'm not gonna buy it.
Now, the last word is yours. I'm through playing.
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CCCs
Joined: 07 Jul 2003
Posts: 762
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Posted: Sun Feb 13, 2005 5:02 am Post subject:
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Yeah, and those same experts predicted Japan was going to overtake us by the year 2000.
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