Quote:
Originally Posted by Strange Brew
Lots of reasons for trade imbalances. The population of a country impacts both its exports and imports and the smaller country isn't necessarily going to have a trade surplus.
The biggest reason for the imbalance right now is that the American economy is outperforming Canada, so Americans have more money to spend.
Trudeau is right though. Canada is probably the best choice for the Americans to have a trade imbalance with. And it's not even that big, mainly due to energy. The imbalance has grown since the pandemic as the US economy has boomed.
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Population is kind of relevant. Our imports are more tied to our population than our exports, as our exports are partially driven by land (and therefore resources). With a higher population we would both consume more of our resources internally and have higher demand for foreign goods. Not that would necessarily be a net positive thing for the USA.