the.com/trade surplus
When a country sells more than it buys and calls it winning, not hoarding.
means The situation when a country's exports are worth more than its imports, leaving it with more money coming in from trade than going out.
from A straightforward compound: 'trade,' from Middle Low German/Middle Dutch roots meaning a path or course (the trodden track of commerce), and 'surplus,' from Old French 'surplus' — 'sur' (over) plus 'plus' (more) — literally 'over-more,' the leftover after everything's accounted for. The economic phrase itself is a modern bookkeeping term, emerging with the formal measurement of national trade balances, no older than the statistics that make it countable.
- not profit
- surplus measures goods, not actual national wealth gained
- china example
- runs massive surpluses by exporting far more than importing
- hidden cost
- often means domestic consumers save and spend less
- mirror problem
- someone else is running the matching deficit, always