BBC NEWS | Business | US trade deficit widens sharply — This news came out today showing that we are sliding further into a hole. We’re going to go further if the dollar, as planned , falls to $1.60 per Euro. The fact that we are in a hole to begin with says we buy more than we sell. This isn’t going to change. It just means we are going to have to pay MORE for what we buy and get less for what we sell. You can see the results already as reported. And since most of our manufacturing is decimated by government policies we can never get our goods cheap enough to make a difference anyway. What money we do have is being thrown away in Iraq to “save face.”
The gap between US exports and imports has widened to more than $60bn (�31.7bn), an all-time record.
Figures from the Commerce Department for November showed exports down 2.3% to $95.6bn, while imports grew 1.3% to $155.8bn on rising consumer demand.
Part of the expanding deficit came from high prices for oil imports.
But the numbers suggested the sliding dollar – which makes exports less expensive – has had little impact, and could indicate slowing economic growth.
John, you keep saying our manufacturing sector has been decimated by government policies? You have said this for a while. Could you provide an example? I just don’t see how the US can compete in manfacturing which seems to be labor driven.
Is there something you know or something that has been explained to you that gives you a viewpoint that the government has been doing something that damages manfacturing?
I ‘m a little surprised that no one has picked up on the dollars vs Euros for oil issue. For people in-the-know, it’s a big issue over here. It’s no secret that most Muslim nations ARE TOTALLY PISSED at America right now.
One act the Arabs can do to really hurt America is to declare that the Euro is the official currency for oil.
THIS has HUGE implications on many levels for the US but one of the most painful would be that our BALLOONING national debt would suddenly be much less attractive to bond investors.
I’m not an economist (and don’t play one on TV) but I get that this is HUGE and the US seems to be missing the story.