"For many years, some economists sounded like car alarms - warning incessantly about America's huge and persistent trade deficit. Nothing happened, though. Unlike, say, in Argentina, Russia, or East Asia during the 1990s, no foreign nations demanded the United States take drastic action to shrink its deficits. The day of reckoning - if it ever was to arrive - seemed a long way off.
Now, there are indications that the world may be starting to lose patience with America's import profligacy and buildup in debts to foreigners.
Foreign interest in buying US stocks and bonds is slipping. May was the third consecutive month foreigners were net sellers of US stocks. Further, Japan appears not so keen on buying dollars to keep the price of the yen down, and thus help its exports be more competitive, now that the Japanese domestic economy has started to bustle. Recent monthly numbers suggest Japan, which already holds 16 percent of US Treasury bonds, is buying fewer of them.
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This year the deficit in the nation's current account will reach a record $600 billion, estimates Charles McMillion, president of MBG Information Services, a Washington economic consulting firm. That deficit measures the trade in goods, such as stereos and cars, as well as services, such as tourism and insurance - indeed most everything except the flow of capital, such as investments and foreign loans. And this current-account deficit continues - to the tune of $1.1 million a minute. The cumulative deficit since 1990 in the US current account adds up to $3.1 trillion, Mr. McMillion calculates."
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http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0729/p17s01-stgn.html