What is causing the trade deficit in the USA? Why is the trade deficit a bad thing?

Question

How much is the trade deficit? Does the trade deficit mean that the USA is buying more than it is selling? (Yes, my knoweledge in economics is admittedly very weak).

Answer 1

The current US trade deficit is aorund $58Billion and shrinking, according to the latest Treasury figures as I type this. And yes, it's the difference between US good sold abroad, and good imported into the US.

Is a deficit a bad thing? Not necessarily. When US buyers buy foreign goods with US dollars, the foreign sellers have to do something with the dollars they earn. They can buy US goods, or invest in US capital markets, either of which is good for the US. Deficits are just the mirror image of capital account surpluses.

Historically, the US trade deficit has been high is times of prosperity, and low during economic recessions. That should suggest on purely empirical grounds that deficits are not harmful to the US economy.

Answer 2

USA imports more items than
we export
so that means more money is leaving the USA
from sales of imported items

So no money is being sent back as trade dollars
from items we export

look at your store shelves

made in china or some other non usa location

That is who is getting all the money

the more we import the more everyone loses

Jobs of people that can make items we use here

we even import toothpicks
geeze

look around as its getting worse andworse

yet everyone in the usa wants $12 an hour

and people over in China work for way less
so they get the money we make sent to them

We don't even make TV sets anymore

no one is stopping it