Did you guys know that the percentage of food we import into the United States grows larger annually??
Same with medications
You are correct - however look at the REASONS for these increases.
- Food, certain items we simply cannot produce domestically (coffee for example) - as well inflation makes the number grow bigger (just as our outflows grow). Bottom line though - we are talking about a 20% deficit to exports and we are a developed consumer nation. Expecting us to send more than we take in would mean we expect to be an agrarian nation / which we haven’t been since the 1800s.
Medicines - again yes, we are an importer of many meds - primarily off patent drugs which are not profitable for companies to produce here and whose primary ingredients are sourced elsewhere. Our patent laws and reciprocal agreements keep this from happening to drugs out less than 20 years. It’s not like we are reliant upon other countries for our newest innovations - it’s the most basic meds we don’t make here. And that’s why this whole tariffs bit is a bad idea - your pissing off nations who control things we NEED over things we send them they don’t.
Our biggest export is petroleum - worst case, there are several nations who will happily make up for the loss of US oil (for a price). Same with wheat/corn - when we shut the tap off - you don’t think Eastern Europe is ready to start taking advantage of the greater prices goods will bring in an attempt to build their shambles of an economy?
We should have been specifically targeting the few nations (China) who were beating us up the worst and to whom we could leverage concessions from ultimately if we WERE NOT in a Trump vs the world showdown. But piss off everyone and it just boost our biggest enemies position. You know the old saying - the enemy of my enemy is my friend…well China is making a lot of friends this week - including a couple right next door to us.
