Imagine applying the same reasoning inside the US:
“Massachusetts buys $2 billion of oranges from Florida. Massachusetts is therefore losing $2 billion. If Massachusetts stops buying oranges, it saves $2 billion.”
That’s plainly incomplete. Massachusetts has oranges in exchange for the money. Requiring Massachusetts to grow all of its own oranges would probably make Massachusetts poorer, not $2 billion richer.
He has no understanding of trade deficit, thinks it’s zero-sum, because the word “deficit” is in it.
Yup. He’s also ignoring other basic economics and accounting like the fact that individual consumers don’t buy the bananas from the producer. Corporations do and then mark them up and sell them for profit. A transaction is not just a loss of money in exchange for a good that then dies or becomes useless. It’s like the fucker has never heard of an asset. You also don’t lose money when you buy equipment for your company that will “pay for itself” through use or even just depreciate in value. I KNOW he understands the concept of net worth… right?
Another day and another story that makes me wonder how this lobotomite made it into office.