The Trump Presidency VII

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dudalb said:
Pretty sure the letter was full of meaningless platitudes, but it is bizaree that Trump would announce he had not read it....
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He meant he can't read it, He was waiting for someone to read it to him.

After he has been tucked in and had his hot milky, someone will read it to him in a gently voice before turning out the light.
 
Captain_Swoop said:
He meant he can't read it, He was waiting for someone to read it to him.

After he has been tucked in and had his hot milky, someone will read it to him in a gently voice before turning out the light.
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It's more likely that someone will draw pictures representing what the letter says and then show them to him.
 
Maybe Europe, Canada etc should sanction Trump and his organisation. It would have more effect.
 
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:confused:
 
lomiller said:
The US is a net importer (runs a trade deficit) because Balance of Payments is zero sum. Very short version: Cash flowing into and out of the US needs to balance. So when US companies make profits abroad or capital investment flows into the US it creates a net cash flow into the US that needs to be offset by money spent to import goods and services.

As long as the US is an attractive investment target and it’s companies make profits worldwide it will run a trade deficit. Trying to make this deficit go away is like a giant game of whack-a-mole. If you block one thing something else will just take it’s place.
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The Economist figures aren't about balance of payments (well in another part of the booklet they might be), they are about the actual net export/import/production/consumption of commodities - e.g. raw materials. I know that's not the whole economic picture due to services provided but it's one way to look at where all the stuff on the planet comes from and goes to. I'm kind of literal-minded about that, even though I know I am not getting the complete picture.

Someone in Panama told me in 2005 that full ships from China were coming into the canal and returning to China with empty shipping containers. Panama was promoting the canal expansion because some shippers/shipbuilders were making Super Panamax ships that were competitive even though they had to sail all the way around South America. To get the expansion financed Panama had to prove their economy was sustainable, which involved raising the (very low) retirement age. There were a lot of issues, a lot of players but on the whole the country wanted the expansion to go through.

Walking through the Pacific side (in Panama City) I found acres and acres of "dollar stores" (It seemed like miles, but that might have been the humidity). I wondered if it was just goods that had been offloaded because it wasn't worth paying the canal transit charges to transport them further. The Atlantic coast was swarming with Chinese on buying trips in Colon, the free zone. Panama City was awash in high rises, but I saw many unfinished floors and I think some of the projects existed mainly to launder money. (Have actual work and expenses but manipulate invoices etc. so contractors collected overcharges, then pay kickbacks to the property developers.)

The Economist book does not mention steel that I can find which is strange. Nothing about iron, either. The U.S. uses more aluminum than it produces while China has a surplus. This is the 2014 booklet; lately I haven't been receiving them.
 
Border Reiver said:
The problem you've got isn't that manufacturing jobs are going away because other nations are doing them better/faster/cheaper than the US - you are losing your manufacturing jobs to automation
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Because those companies need to move to other countries to have that automation?
 
dudalb said:
Pretty sure the letter was full of meaningless platitudes, but it is bizaree that Trump would announce he had not read it....
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If we were talking about a competent adult with a functional I.Q. above room temperature and a degree of actual political acumen which could be expressed in something higher than negative numbers then yes, it would be bizarre.

But we aren't. We're talking about Trump.

So, no. It's perfectly normal.
 
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