The US economy is 'indifferent' even without a war. If total peace is declared, it will linger undoubts about Iraq - also, taking the unemployment rate that hit an eight year high nine years ago at 6% that has stayed stagnant albeit it fell to 5.7%. Forecasts are touting an umeployment at 6.3% by June 2003 , and regarding the trade defecit; ponder on this.
How big is $380,000,000,000?
by Eamonn Fingleton Thursday, February 28, 2002
$$$ It works out to about $1,450 for every man, woman, and child in the United States.
$$$ It is 2.5 times the total GDP of Saudia Arabia, the world's biggest oil exporting nation.
$$$ It is equal to the estimated entire manufacturing output of China, the world’s most populous nation.
$$$ It is more than 40 times America’s entire overseas development aid budget .
$$$ It is more than 1,500 times the cost of all vaccines used annually in the Third World.
$$$ If delivered in dollar bills, it would weigh 340,000 tons – or about seven times the weight of the Titanic. The money would require a fleet of 2,970 Boeing 747 freighters to transport.
$$$ Placed end to end in dollar bills, it would stretch about 37 million miles – or more than one third the way to the sun. If the dollar bills were stacked one on top of the other they would rise 26,000 miles into space.
STATISTICAL NOTE: The forecast is calculated on a “goods and services” basis – the same basis used by the U.S. government in announcing the widely reported monthly trade figures.
How big is $530,000,000,000?
Monday, January 13, 2003
How big is $530,000,000,000?
$$$ It works out to about $2,020 for every man, woman, and child in the United States.
$$$ It is 3.5 times the total GDP of Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest oil exporting nation.
$$$ It is equal to the estimated entire manufacturing output of China, the world’s most populous nation.
$$$ It is more than 50 times America’s entire overseas development aid budget .
$$$ It is more than 2,100 times the cost of all vaccines used annually in the Third World.
$$$ If delivered in dollar bills, it would weigh 475,000 tons – or about ten times the weight of the Titanic. The money would require a fleet of 4,200 Boeing 747 freighters to transport.
$$$ Placed end to end in dollar bills, it would stretch about 52 million miles – or about half the way to the sun. If the dollar bills were stacked one on top of the other they would rise 36,000 miles into space.
STATISTICAL NOTE: The forecast is calculated on a “current account” basis – the most comprehensive and meaningful measure of trade and the one used by economists and other experts. This is distinct from the "goods-and-services" basis used by the U.S. government in announcing the widely reported monthly trade figures. Generally the current account basis produces figures significantly larger than the goods-and-services basis.
Add to that, the Japan economic collapse the US now need China to take up the load and add to that, the US NAtional Debt where each US citizen's share of debt stands at $22k, and growing $1.29 billion per day. It does not paint a pretty picture.
All the unrealistic mania started from the Wall street journal in the good old days. How come the current mania has hitherto been subjected to so little reality checking in the US press ? As J.K. Galbraith has pointed out, "an economic error proliferates when someone somewhere has an interest in promoting it."
In the case of the present U.S. trade crisis, two key sources of error have been playing a role -- the foreign trade lobby and the Wall Street securities industry.
The former’s role is obvious. In Wall Street’s case, the error is driven in part by a recognition that many US corporations gain a short-term profits boost from shipping jobs to places like Mexico and China – a boost, however, that comes at the expense of the US already fast-dwindling manufacturing workforce - due to technology and other factors.
Particularly where American workers have no similarly productive new jobs to move to, the result is seriously hurting the US economy. The Housing market is the last bastion if the Labor markets do not get re-invogorated and fast.
