Monday, April 4, 2016

A GIF, Milton Friedman, and Trucker Bob?

Usually people like seeing GIFs. They can be hilarious but when I hear the word GIF I don't think about economics. But this GIF below show China's trading with the U.S. from 1985 to 2015.
This GIF shows that the value of the goods we import from China is much greater than what we export to China. The GIF also shows the United States' new trade deficit that has hit a new record of $365.7 billion dollars.

Now this doesn't mean we need to panic because this doesn't necessary mean that we are in trouble or as some candidates would say China is "beating" us. There are always two sides to every story, trade deficit is no different. Below are two arguments given to you readers, after you read them make you decision.

Side 1 - THIS IS TERRIBLE!
Dear U.S. Citizens,
Please do not be fooled by people telling you trade deficit is ok, it is NOT ok. Do you people have no shame, free market economies and Chicago economies are the only ones who see the tragedy that is trade deficit, except Donald Trump of course. Do you not remember what I thought all of you? Its simple, a good trade deficit is the best possible outcome we can have! More money for us!
- Milton Friedman

Side 2 - It's not so bad.
Dear whoever reads the blog,
I know it sounds like it's a bad thing that we have a high trade deficit but like for me it helps. It's been hard to find work and when there is trade deficit, employment is actually a lot better. And like I don't know if you noticed but when we start to import lots of stuff from China our U.S. businesses start to get really competitive and make a lot nicer things. Which is always good for me because it means they usually need an extra hand to do some work. So I like high trade deficit because it increases the number of jobs available.
- Trucker Bob


so what do you think? Is trade deficit good or bad?

No comments:

Post a Comment