Is the USA really in deep decline as Trump claims?

[John Clark]

Trump claims that the US is in a steep decline because other nations have been taking advantage of us for years, so a radical change in economic policy is necessary, hence his astronomically high tariffs. But is that really true? On Fareed Zakaria's show last Sunday he mentioned some interesting statistics: 

In 2008 the GDP of the Eurozone was about the same as that of the USA, but by 2023 it was almost twice as large.

In 1990 US average wages were about 20% larger than a worker in another advanced industrial world country, but they are now about 40% higher. 

In 1995 the average Japanese person was 54% richer than an average person in the US in terms of GDP per capita, but today the average American is 150% richer than the average Japanese. 

A resident of the poorest American State, Mississippi, has a higher per capita GDP than the average resident of Britain or France or Japan. 

Today the US economy is the envy of the world, but Donald Trump will soon put an end to that! 

Fareed’s Take: Trump’s tariffs and what they show

John K Clark    See what's on my new list at  Extropolis

dtq

[Cosmin Visan]

Who cares about economy if you live in a dystopian woke world where women hate you and stopped giving you children ? Stop being autistic and focus on reality, not abstract numbers!

[Brent Meeker]

On 4/7/2025 5:05 AM, John Clark wrote:

Trump claims that the US is in a steep decline because other nations have been taking advantage of us for years, so a radical change in economic policy is necessary, hence his astronomically high tariffs. But is that really true? On Fareed Zakaria's show last Sunday he mentioned some interesting statistics: 

In 2008 the GDP of the Eurozone was about the same as that of the USA, but by 2023 it was almost twice as large.

I think "it" refers to the US GDP, not the Eurozone's.

In 1990 US average wages were about 20% larger than a worker in another advanced industrial world country, but they are now about 40% higher. 

In 1995 the average Japanese person was 54% richer than an average person in the US in terms of GDP per capita, but today the average American is 150% richer than the average Japanese.

How about the median?  Averages can be highly skewed due to a few billionaires.

A resident of the poorest American State, Mississippi, has a higher per capita GDP than the average resident of Britain or France or Japan. 

Today the US economy is the envy of the world, but Donald Trump will soon put an end to that!

Already has.  Like many international relations, trade depends largely on trust...and nobody can trust The Donald.

Brent

Fareed’s Take: Trump’s tariffs and what they show

John K Clark    See what's on my new list at  Extropolis

dtq

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-li...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/CAJPayv1707vRSyoXqBxZSpSC98bfMztfGbJ6ck%2BaVZaPSt3aWg%40mail.gmail.com.

[John Clark]

On Mon, Apr 7, 2025 at 5:06 PM Brent Meeker <meeke...@gmail.com> wrote:

>> In 1990 US average wages were about 20% larger than a worker in another advanced industrial world country, but they are now about 40% higher. 
In 1995 the average Japanese person was 54% richer than an average person in the US in terms of GDP per capita, but today the average American is 150% richer than the average Japanese.

> How about the median?  Averages can be highly skewed due to a few billionaires.

True but irrelevant. Trump wasn't claiming that unfair trade practices increase the gap between the rich and the poor, he was claiming unfair (Trump is always whining about things being "unfair")  trade practices have impoverished the US as a whole, and clearly that is not the case. However it is true that Trump's huge tariff increase would not only reduce the per capita GDP it would also increase the already huge gap between the rich and the poor because a tariff is in effect a tax on the poor and middle class because it is a tax on consumables and durable goods, and they spend a far larger percentage of their meager income on that than the super rich do. 

I note that yesterday Trump blinked and reduced his very very imbecilic tariffs so that now they're only very imbecilic. With two exceptions Trump put a 10% tariff  on every nation in the world, which is still extremely high, during the Obama administration when the economy was growing at an extremely rapid rate the average tariff was only about 2.5%.  

One exception is Russia, Trump put a 0.0% tariff on Russia but put a 10% tariff on Ukraine. The other exception is what is perhaps our most important trade partner, China. Yesterday Trump increased the Chinese tariff from 105% to 125%, although in practice that increase makes little difference because either figure effectively brings any trade between the two nations to a complete halt; China, of course, retaliated and put an 84% tariff on US goods sent to China.  Most of the goods we sent to China are agricultural products, so this would hurt farmers the most and they are some of Trump's strongest supporters.  This is a classic lose lose solution.

Apparently what convinced Trump to back down is that historically when we had a huge stock market drop like we've had over the last few days there was a corresponding increase in the safe haven of government bonds, but that didn't happen this time. There was weak demand for new US Treasury debt because foreign countries were not  buying new US Treasury bonds and were selling the ones they already had. 

Inside Trump’s tariff retreat: How fears of a bond market catastrophe convinced Trump to hit the pause button

  John K Clark    See what's on my new list at  Extropolis

ooh

[Cosmin Visan]

Well... given that family was destroyed by feminism with 50% of marriages ending in divorce and with the rise of hookup culture created by women, is pretty clear that indeed America is in decline.

[John Clark]

Correction: Trump's tariff on China is actually 145% not 125% as I said, sorry. Trump said it was 125% and I foolishly believed he at least knew how big of a tariff he was putting on our most important trading partner, but of course he didn't. I feel like an idiot, I believed him! 

By the way, even with these reduced tariffs that were announced yesterday it's estimated that due to rising prices it will cost the average household about $4500 a year; and to think people voted for Trump because they thought the price of eggs was too high. What do you suppose a steep inflation spike is gonna do to Trump's popularity rating? 

John K Clark    See what's on my new list at  Extropolis

9cq

[Alan Grayson]

IMO, FWIW, we're headed for a full blown Depression. Numerous small and medium sized businesses, which employ about half the working population, will be filing for bankrupcy, and the domestic auto industry will experience major declines in production. AG 

[Cosmin Visan]

Awww... so saaad.

[Brent Meeker]

Isn't it clear that Trump is a Russian asset.  He's not trying to improve the U.S. trading position.  He's sowing uncertainty, and uncertainty is like sand in the gears of the Western economy.  It doesn't matter that he "pauses" the tariffs.  The tax isn't the point.  Even that his own family can make a $B or so on the pump&dump isn't the point.  It's the uncertainty itself that is the point.

Brent

[Brent Meeker]

He's done so many stupid things and told so many lies, I despair of his popularity falling.  It's a cult...completely immune to facts.

Brent