Trump misreading a sign of American economic strength -- trade deficits -- as a weakness

U.S.'s 'Trade Deficit' Is Bullish

Donald Boudreaux, American Institute for Economic Research Foreign holdings of US dollars would better be called an "investment surplus." Our top exports aren't goods — they're stability and...

America’s Trade ‘Deficit’ Is a Ringing Endorsement

As noted in my previous column, foreign holdings of US dollars are classified as foreign holdings of US assets and, thus, contribute to US trade deficits. But as I argued, it would be perfectly reasonable to classify foreign holdings of US dollars, not as holdings of US assets, but instead as foreign purchases of a US export — purchases, specifically, of the services of an especially useful currency to hold or for conducting global commerce. Bec…

(Washington = Yonhap News) Correspondents Cho Jun-hyung, Park Seong-min, and Kim Dong-hyun = The Donald Trump administration in the United States is using unfair trade practices and the trade surplus with the United States as an excuse to impose high rates of reciprocal...

Large US trade deficit isn’t the problem Trump claims it is – it’s actually a sign of strength

It signals America’s financial and technological dominance.

Inside Trump's dumb lifelong obsession with tariffs and trade deficits

Donald Trump’s chaotic ethos can be summed up in this sentence: Never admit you’re wrong, and only weak countries carry trade deficits. Those two pillars of Trump’s political thought have ...

Q&A: Jason Furman on why trade deficits are ‘a wonderful thing’

The SceneUS President Donald Trump’s tariffs are tanking markets, forcing allies and adversaries to respond, and making it all but impossible for business leaders to feel comfortable making long-term investment plans of the kind the White House wants.They have also reopened a debate about whether trade deficits are a sign of weakness or strength, which is how we got Elon Musk circulating a Milton Friedman defense of free trade and the Chinese em…