Let's talk about Trump's trade deficit, up or down.... - Belle of the Ranch

[TexasTowelie]

Well, howdy there Internet people. It's Belle again. So, today we're going to talk about Trump's trade deficit.

Depending on the outlet you watch, or where you get your news, or whether you consider Trump himself a reliable source of information, you've heard different things about the trade deficit, which was Trump's stated reason for his frankly disastrous trade war. But I think the trade war was disastrous for a bunch of reasons.

Did it at least accomplish his goal of lowering the trade deficits? Going all the way back to 2016 he said things like, "We tax and regulate and restrict our companies to death, and then we allow foreign countries that cheat to export their goods to us tax-free." Notice back then he was acknowledging a tariff was a tax. And for a decade, he's been talking about the goods trade deficit.

Here's a message. “Belle, did the trade deficit go up or down? Trump said it was down by 78%. Which, yeah, not a source, but some reputable outlets say it went down, some say it went up. How can we have this much debate over numbers?

The problem is that people are measuring different things and there's a lot of spin. Is it down 78%? Of course not. Not unless you wildly cherry-pick data under the assumption that the people you're talking to are well, like the man says, he loves the uneducated. You can get roughly 78% if you torture the numbers long enough and cherry-pick a month that had massive imports to avoid Trump's tariffs as your start date, March 2025, and then go to October 2025 to try to show a decline. His preferred period doesn't even align with quarters. It's just a made-up framing to dupe people. As you said, Trump is not a source.

Is the overall trade deficit down if you use a normal period of time and don't cherry-pick? Yes, actually a grand total of about $3 billion. In 2024, the overall trade deficit was just over $904 billion. In 2025, it was just over $901 billion. So roughly a three-tenths of 1% drop in the trade deficit. Completely insignificant, but technically it is down.

However, that's the overall trade deficit. As that quote showed, for a decade, he's been talking specifically about goods, imported goods. So what about the goods trade deficit? You know, since that was his goal, we should measure his success in his terms. Not only did it not go down, it went up about 2%. It's the largest deficit on record, $1.24 trillion. The tariffs are a failure. There's no spinning this. All they did was make you pay more.

The overall trade deficit includes goods and services. And it's down because of increased US services being sold overseas, not because of his antiquated economic ideas. Basically, industries like banking sold more services overseas. So, the overall trade deficit dropped a few billion even though the goods trade deficit went up. The overall trade deficit is still the third highest in history. The short version is that bankers made more overseas while you paid more here. Truly a Golden Age.

Anyway, it's just a thought. Y'all have a good day.