Hi tekgk; ***OT*** Some more stuff the US is the world
leader in:
Cars, Lots of kinds of chips (i.e. FPGAs, FIFOs, generally
the US leads in high margin specialty integrated circuits),
food, broadcasting, advanced weaponry, prepared food,
fast food franchises, books, lumber, scrap cardboard (haha),
finances, serial killers, personal computers, supercomputers,
high end audio, audio entertainment, compact disks,
freedom, sex, drugs, rock and roll, travel, space craft,
printers, furniture, hobbies of all sorts, art, science,
polititcs, internet companies, etc.
We have had trade deficits before, but even if we made
exactly what the rest of the world wants, given the current
world situation we would run a trade deficit.
Cause the good that we make that the rest of the world
really, really, really want is greenbacks.
If we happened to have the world's biggest gold mines
and the rest of the world were importing our gold, no
one would think of that as deficit spending... But those
dollar bills are a lot cheaper to print than gold is to dig.
Someday the rest of the world will realize they've been
duped and they will dump the dollars they've hoarded
back onto us. Then our trade deficit will reverse, but
prices for imported stuff and inflation will blow up.
Don't know when it's going to happen, though. But
it has happened in the recent past. Back when Nixon
was in office, the world started dumping dollars. Eventually
gold went sky high. But right now, the rest of the world
sees those dollars (at current US interest rates) as safer
than foreign currencies, particularly their own.
-- Carl |
