Economy of the United States
From Free net encyclopedia
Template:Life in the United States The United States has the largest and one of the most technologically advanced national economies in the world, with a GDP of 13.049 trillion dollars. In this capitalistic, free market-oriented mixed economy, corporations and other private firms make the vast majority of microeconomic decisions, and governments prefer to take a minimal role in the domestic economy. Because of this, the U.S. has a small social safety net, and business firms in the U.S. face considerably less regulation than firms in many other nations. The fiscal policy of the nation since the New Deal has followed the general ideals of Keynesian economics, which replaced Classical economics following the Great Depression. Neoliberal ideals have become more prominent since the presidency of Ronald Reagan and with the growing influence of globalization. Since the early 1980s, the United States has transformed from being the world's largest creditor to having a substantial current account deficit and a national debt of unprecedented size relative to national GDP since World War II.
Contents |
History
Main article: Economic history of the United States
With President Harding's post–WW I "Return to Normalcy", the United States enjoyed a period of great prosperity. The stock market grew by leaps and bounds, fueled by the inflationary policies of the Fed, and the economy was considered invincible. However, the Great Depression shattered that belief, and after years of unsuccessful attempts to rein in the economy with cuts in spending, President Franklin D. Roosevelt introduced an array of social programs and public works, known collectively as the New Deal. The New Deal followed the policies of Keynesian economics, and was an attempt to implement a social safety net, and to bring the United States out of the Depression through investing into the economy by deficit spending. In 1941, the U.S. entered World War II, driving federal spending and debt up to record levels to drive industrial production, pulling the U.S. out of the Depression. The post–WW II years, like the 1920s, were a time of great prosperity in the United States. The economy remained stable until the 1970s, when the U.S. suffered stagflation. Richard Nixon took the United States off the Bretton Woods system, and further government attempts to revive the economy failed. As the decade progressed, the situation worsened. In November 1980, Robert G. Anderson wrote, "the death knell is finally sounding for the Keynesian Revolution." Ronald Reagan was elected President in 1980, and was of the opinion that "government is not the solution to our problem, government is the problem." Reagan advocated a program of 'supply-side economics', and in 1981 Congress cut taxes and spending, and reduced regulations. Although the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) declined by 2% in 1982, it proceeded to rebound, and by 1988 had enjoyed a total of 31% growth since Reagan's election. Under Bill Clinton's eight years of presidency, the GDP expanded by 38%. By the end of his tenure the US had a gross national product of $9.8 trillion, and the lowest unemployment rates in 30 years. A recession began during in 2000 in connection to the end of the dot-com bubble. Throughout, housing starts and purchases remained high, and the economy as of 2005 is considered by many to be strong in general. Some fear high government spending (such as in the Iraq War) as well as high oil prices may accelerate inflation. There are also warnings that the Federal Government needs to re-balance the budget to avoid potential default. While default does not appear a probable outcome, it is highly likely that persistent high budget deficits will drag down the economy in the future. This applies even more so to the current account deficit and external debt.
U.S. liabilities to foreigners are estimated at $13 trillion in 2005, and continue to grow. [1]
Basic ingredients of the U.S. economy
The first ingredient of a nation's economic system is its natural resources. The United States is rich in mineral resources and fertile farm soil, and it is fortunate to have a moderate climate. It also has extensive coastlines on both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, as well as on the Gulf of Mexico. Rivers flow from far within the continent, and the Great Lakes—five large, inland lakes along the U.S. border with Canada—provide additional shipping access. These extensive waterways have helped shape the country's economic growth over the years and helped bind America's 50 individual states together in a single economic unit.
The second ingredient is labor. Number of available workers and, more importantly, their productivity help determine the health of an economy. Throughout its history, the United States has experienced steady growth in the labor force, and that, in turn, has helped fuel almost constant economic expansion. Until shortly after World War I, most workers were immigrants from Europe, their immediate descendants, or African Americans who were mostly slaves taken from Africa, or slave decendants . Beginning in the early 20th century, many Latin Americans immigrated; followed by large numbers of Asians following removal of nation-origin based immigration quotas. The promise of high wages brings many highly skilled workers from around the world to the United States.
Labor mobility has also been important to the capacity of the American economy to adapt to changing conditions. When immigrants flooded labor markets on the East Coast, many workers moved inland, often to farmland waiting to be tilled. Similarly, economic opportunities in industrial, northern cities attracted black Americans from southern farms in the first half of the 20th century.
Third, there is manufacturing and investment. In the United States, the corporation has emerged as an association of owners, known as stockholders, who form a business enterprise governed by a complex set of rules and customs. Brought on by the process of mass production, corporations such as General Electric have been instrumental in shaping the United States. Through the stock market, American banks and investors have grown their economy by investing and withdrawing capital from profitable corporations. Today in the era of globalization American investors and corporations have influence all over the world. American governments have also been instrumental in investing in the economy, in areas such as providing cheap electricity (such as the Hoover Dam), and military contracts in times of war.
A mixed economy: The role of the market
The United States is said to have a mixed economy because privately owned businesses and government both play important roles. Indeed, some of the most enduring debates of American economic history focus on the relative roles of the public and private sectors.
Image:Consumer expenditure us pie chart.gif The American free enterprise system emphasizes private ownership. Private businesses produce most goods and services, and almost two-thirds of the nation's total economic output goes to individuals for personal use (the remaining one-third is bought by government and business). The consumer role is so great, in fact, that the nation is sometimes characterized as having a "consumer economy."
However, like in all modern economies, there are limits to free enterprise and private ownership. Americans generally agree that some services are better performed by public rather than private enterprise. For instance, in the United States, government is primarily responsible for the administration of justice, education (although there are many private schools and training centers), the road system, social statistical reporting, and national defense. In addition, government often is asked to intervene in the economy to correct situations in which the price system does not work. It regulates "natural monopolies," for example, and it uses antitrust laws to control or break up other business combinations that it claims have become so powerful that they can surmount market forces.
Government also addresses issues beyond the reach of market forces. It provides welfare and unemployment benefits to people who cannot or will not support themselves, either because they encounter problems in their personal lives or lose their jobs as a result of economic upheaval; it pays much of the cost of medical care for the aged and those who live in poverty; it regulates private industry to limit air and water pollution; it provides low-cost loans to people who suffer losses as a result of natural disasters; and it has played the leading role in the exploration of space, which is too expensive for any private enterprise to handle. All of this is paid for by a system of progressive taxation.
In this mixed economy, individuals can help guide the economy not only through the choices they make as consumers but through the votes they cast for officials who shape economic policy. In recent years, consumers have voiced concerns about product safety, environmental threats posed by certain industrial practices, and potential health risks citizens may face; government has responded by creating agencies which aim to protect consumer interests and promote the general public welfare.
The U.S. economy has changed in other ways as well. The population and the labor force have shifted dramatically away from farms to cities, from fields to factories, and, above all, to service industries. In today's economy, the providers of personal and public services far outnumber producers of agricultural and manufactured goods. As the economy has grown more complex, statistics also reveal over the last century a sharp long-term trend away from self-employment toward working for others.
Government's role in the economy
While consumers and producers make most decisions that mold the economy, government activities have a powerful effect on the U.S. economy in at least four areas. Strong government regulation in the U.S. economy started in the early 1900s; before that date, it was a nearly pure free market economy.
Stabilization and growth
Perhaps most importantly, the federal government guides the overall pace of economic activity, attempting to maintain steady growth, high levels of employment, and price stability. By adjusting spending and tax rates (fiscal policy) or managing the money supply and controlling the use of credit (monetary policy), it can slow down or speed up the economy's rate of growth—in the process, affecting the level of prices and employment.
For many years following the Great Depression of the 1930s, recessions—periods of slow economic growth and high unemployment—were viewed as the greatest of economic threats. When the danger of recession appeared most serious, government sought to strengthen the economy by spending heavily itself or cutting taxes so that consumers would spend more, and by fostering rapid growth in the money supply, which also encouraged more spending. In the 1970s, major price increases, particularly for energy, created a strong fear of inflation—increases in the overall level of prices. As a result, government leaders came to concentrate more on controlling inflation than on combating recession by limiting spending, resisting tax cuts, and reining in growth in the money supply.
Ideas about the best tools for stabilizing the economy changed substantially between the 1960s and the 1990s. In the 1960s, government had great faith in fiscal policy—manipulation of government revenues to influence the economy. Since spending and taxes are controlled by the president and the U.S. Congress, these elected officials played a leading role in directing the economy. A period of high inflation, high unemployment, and huge government deficits weakened confidence in fiscal policy as a tool for regulating the overall pace of economic activity. Instead, monetary policy—controlling the nation's money supply through such devices as interest rates—assumed growing prominence. Monetary policy is directed by the nation's central bank, known as the Federal Reserve Board, with considerable independence from the president and the Congress.
Regulation and control
The U.S. federal government regulates private enterprise in numerous ways. Regulation falls into two general categories. Economic regulation seeks, either directly or indirectly, to control prices. Traditionally, the government has sought to prevent monopolies such as electric utilities from raising prices beyond the level that would ensure them reasonable profits. At times, the government has extended economic control to other kinds of industries as well. In the years following the Great Depression, it devised a complex system to stabilize prices for agricultural goods, which tend to fluctuate wildly in response to rapidly changing supply and demand. A number of other industries—trucking and, later, airlines—successfully sought regulation themselves to limit what they considered harmful price cutting.
Another form of economic regulation, antitrust law, seeks to strengthen market forces so that direct regulation is unnecessary. The government—and, sometimes, private parties—have used antitrust law to prohibit practices or mergers that would unduly limit competition.
In 1933, Congress created the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) which presently guarantees checking and savings deposits in member banks up to $100,000 per depositor to prevent bank failures. This was in response to the widespread bank runs of the early 1930s during the Great Depression.
Since the 1970s, government has also exercised control over private companies to achieve social goals, such as protecting the public's health and safety or maintaining a clean and healthy environment. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration tightly regulates what drugs may reach the market, for example; the Occupational Safety and Health Administration protects workers from hazards they may encounter in their jobs; and the Environmental Protection Agency seeks to control water and air pollution.
Such agencies draw heavy criticism from conservatives, who question the agencies' efficiency and necessity.
American attitudes about regulation changed substantially during the final three decades of the 20th century. Beginning in the 1970s, policy makers grew increasingly concerned that economic regulation protected inefficient companies at the expense of consumers in industries such as airlines and trucking. At the same time, technological changes spawned new competitors in some industries, such as telecommunications, that once were considered natural monopolies. Both developments led to a succession of laws easing regulation.
While leaders of America's two most influential political parties generally favored economic deregulation during the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, there was less agreement concerning regulations designed to achieve social goals. Social regulation had assumed growing importance in the years following the Depression and World War II, and again in the 1960s and 1970s. But during the presidency of Ronald Reagan in the 1980s, the government relaxed rules intended to protect workers, consumers, and the environment, arguing that regulation interfered with free enterprise, increased the costs of doing business, and thus contributed to inflation. Still, many Americans continued to voice concerns about specific events or trends, prompting the government to issue new regulations in some areas, including environmental protection. As of March 2005, it is estimated that compliance with government regulation costs the U.S. economy $1.4 trillion a year. [2]
Some citizens, meanwhile, have turned to the courts when they feel their elected officials are not addressing certain issues quickly or strongly enough. For instance, in the 1990s, individuals, and eventually government itself, sued tobacco companies over the health risks of cigarette smoking. A large financial settlement provided states with long-term payments to cover medical costs to treat smoking-related illnesses. The money is mostly spent (or will be spent, as checks are often written in anticipation of payments) for other purposes.
Direct services
Each level of government provides many direct services. The federal government, for example, is responsible for national defense, backs research that often leads to the development of new products, conducts space exploration, and runs numerous programs designed to help workers develop workplace skills and find jobs. Government spending has a significant effect on local and regional economies—and even on the overall pace of economic activity.
State governments, meanwhile, are responsible for the construction and maintenance of most highways. State, county, or city governments play the leading role in financing and operating public schools. Local governments are primarily responsible for police and fire protection. Government spending in each of these areas can also affect local and regional economies, although federal decisions generally have the greatest economic impact
Overall, federal, state, and local spending accounted for almost 28 percent of gross domestic product in 1998.[3]
Direct assistance
Government also provides many kinds of help to businesses and individuals. It offers low-interest loans and technical assistance to small businesses, and it provides loans to help students attend college. Government-sponsored enterprises buy home mortgages from lenders and turn them into securities that can be bought and sold by investors, thereby encouraging home lending. Government also actively promotes exports and seeks to prevent foreign countries from maintaining trade barriers that restrict imports.
Government supports individuals who cannot or will not adequately care for themselves. Social Security, which is financed by a tax on employers and employees, accounts for the largest portion of Americans' retirement income. The Medicare program pays for many of the medical costs of the elderly. The Medicaid program finances medical care for low-income families. In many states, government maintains institutions for the mentally ill or people with severe disabilities. The federal government provides food stamps to help poor families obtain food, and the federal and state governments jointly provide welfare grants to support low-income parents with children.
Many of these programs, including Social Security, trace their roots to the "New Deal" programs of Franklin D. Roosevelt, who served as the U.S. president from 1933 to 1945. Key to Roosevelt's reforms was a belief that poverty usually resulted from social and economic causes rather than from failed personal morals. This view repudiated a common notion whose roots lay in New England Puritanism that success was a sign of God's favor and failure a sign of God's displeasure. This was an important transformation in American social and economic thought. Even today, however, echoes of the older notions are still heard in debates around certain issues, especially welfare.
Many other assistance programs for individuals and families, including Medicare and Medicaid, were begun in the 1960s during President Lyndon Johnson's (1963–1969) "War on Poverty." Although some of these programs encountered financial difficulties in the 1990s and various reforms were proposed, they continued to have strong support from both of the United States' major political parties. Critics argued, however, that providing welfare to unemployed but healthy individuals actually created dependency rather than solving problems. Welfare reform legislation enacted in 1996 under President Bill Clinton (1993–2001) requires people to work as a condition of receiving benefits and imposes limits on how long individuals may receive payments.
National debt
Main article: U.S. public debt
The national debt, also known as the U.S. public debt and the gross federal debt, is the overall collective sum of yearly federal budget deficits owed by the United States federal government. The economic significance of this debt and its potential ramifications for future generations of Americans are controversial issues in the United States.
The borrowing cap debt ceiling as of 2005 stood at 8.18 trillion. [4]. In March of 2006, Congress raised that ceiling an additional .79 trillion to $8.97 trillion. [5]Congress has used this method to deal with an encroaching debt ceiling in previous years, as the federal borrowing limit was raised in 2002 and 2003. [6]
The size of the debt is in the trillions and consequently it has been part of popular culture to parody the growing debt with some type of doomsday clock, graphically showing the growing indebtedness every second.
While the U.S. national debt is the world's largest in absolute size, a more accurate measure is that of its size relative to the nation's GDP. When the national debt is put into this perspective it appears considerably less today than in past years, particularly during World War II. By this measure, it is also considerably less than other industrialized nations such as Japan and roughly equivalent to several Western European nations.[7]
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Poverty
- Main article: Poverty in the United States
There is significant disagreement about poverty in the United States; particularly over how poverty ought to be defined. Using radically different definitions, two major groups of advocates have claimed variously (a) that the United States has eliminated poverty over the last century; or (b) that it has such a severe crisis of poverty that it ought to devote significantly more resources to the problem.
Much of the debate about poverty focuses on (a) statistical measures of poverty and (b) the clash between advocates and opponents of welfare programs and government regulation of the market. Measures of poverty can be either absolute or relative.
Income inequality
The United Nations Development Programme Report 2005 ranks income the United States as the 74th most equal out of 124 countries, as measured by the Gini coefficient. The richest 10% make 15.9 times as much as the poorest 10%, and the richest 20% make 8.4 times as much as the poorest 20%. (See List of countries by income equality.)
Minimum wage
Sixteen states and the District of Columbia have minimum wages higher than the national level ($5.15 per-hour), including the highest, Oregon State at $7.50. Twenty-six states are the same as the federal level; two — Ohio and Kansas — are below; and six do not have state laws.
Wages and occupations (2004)
Total Wages (June 2005) = (Employed Labor Force)(Average Weekly Wage)(52 weeks) - $5,186,429,731,600
Average Weekly Wage (June 2005) - $751
Total Wages as a percentage of Nominal GDP (Q2 2005) - 41.9%
Domestic industries - $43,328
- Private industries - $42,635
- Agriculture, forestry, fishing, and hunting - $26,371
- Farms - $27,533
- Forestry, fishing, and related activity - $24,989
- Mining - $67,782
- Oil and Gas Extraction - $109,263
- Mining, except oil and gas - $54,007
- Support activities for mining - $56,184
- Utilities - $73,040
- Construction - $41,945
- Manufacturing - $48,731
- Durable Goods - $51,125
- Wood products - $33,710
- Nonmetallic mineral products - $43,002
- Primary metals - $51,710
- Fabricated metal products - $41,967
- Machinery - $51,589
- Computer and electronic products - $74,649
- Electrical equipment, appliances, and components - $46,741
- Motor vehicles, bodies and trailers, and components - $54,728
- Other transportation equipment - $62,546
- Furniture and related products - $33,090
- Miscellaneous Manufacturing - $45,672
- Non-Durable Goods - $44,758
- Food and beverage and tobacco products - $37,656
- Textile mills and textile product mills - $32,845
- Apparel and Leather and applied products - $29,790
- Paper products - $51,420
- Printing and related support activities - $40,619
- Petroleum and Coal Products - $76,067
- Chemical products - $69,382
- Plastics and rubber products - $39,961
- Wholesale trade - $55,325
- Durable goods - $57,248
- Non-durable goods - $52,631
- Retail trade - $28,216
- Motor Vehicle and parts dealers - $44,699
- Food and Beverage stores - $23,264
- General Merchandise Stores - $21,800
- Other Retail - $28,332
- Transportation and warehousing - $42,505
- Air Transportation - $58,201
- Rail Transportation - $69,637
- Water Transportation - $61,790
- Truck Transportation - $39,728
- Transit and ground passenger transportation - $24,643
- Pipeline Transportation - $88,661
- Other Transportation and support activities - $40,715
- Warehousing and storage - $37,284
- Information - $65,708
- Publishing Industries (includes software) - $68,279
- Motion picture and sound recording industries - $60,167
- Broadcasting and Telecommunications - $63,597
- Information and data processing services - $71,686
- Finance and Insurance - $73,010
- Federal Reserve banks, credit inter-mediation, and related activities - $56,284
- Securities, commodity contracts, and investments - $164,711
- Insurance carriers and related activities - $61,534
- Fund, trusts, and other financial vehicles - $87,188
- Real estate and rental and leasing - $41,116
- Real estate - $42,888
- Rental and leasing services and lessors of intangible assets - $37,082
- Professional, scientific, and technical services - $66,439
- Legal services - $71,358
- Computer systems design and related services - $82,609
- Miscellaneous professional, scientific, and technical services - $61,165
- Management of companies and enterprises - $82,539
- Administrative and waste management services - $29,664
- Administrative and support services - $28,883
- Waste management and remediation services - $46,889
- Educational services - $33,740
- Health care and social assistance - $40,328
- Ambulatory health care services - $51,980
- Hospitals - $45,469
- Nursing and residential care facilities - $25,933
- Social assistance - $23,216
- Arts, entertainment, and recreation - $34,921
- Performing arts, spectator sports, museums, and related activities - $65,644
- Amusements, gambling, and recreation industries - $24,456
- Accommodation and food services - $19,934
- Accommodation - $30,762
- Food services and drinking places - $17,691
- Government - $46,941
- Federal - $60,046
- General Government - $60,338
- Civilian - $66,558
- Military - $53,239
- Government enterprises - $58,670
- State and Local - $43,533
- General government - $43,329
- Education - $43,181
- Other - $43,498
- Government enterprises [2] - $46,432
Other statistics
Industrial production growth rate: 0.3% (2003 est.)
Electricity:
- production: 3,892 TWh (2003)
- consumption: 3,656 TWh (2003)
- exports: 23.97 TWh (2003)
- imports: 30.39 TWh (2003)
Electricity - production by source:
- fossil fuel: 71.4%
- hydro: 5.6%
- nuclear: 20.7%
- other: 2.3% (2001)
Oil:
- production: 7.8 million barrel/day (2004 est.)
- consumption: 19.65 million barrel/day (2001 est.)
- exports: NA
- imports: NA
- net imports: 12.097 million barrel/day (2004 est.)
- proved reserves: 22.45 billion barrel (1 January 2002)
Natural gas:
- production: 548.1 billion m³ (2001 est.)
- consumption: 640.9 billion m³ (2001 est.)
- exports: 11.16 billion m³ (2001 est.)
- imports: 114.1 billion m³ (2001 est.)
- proved reserves: 5.195 trillion m³ (1 January 2002)
Agriculture - products: wheat, corn, other grains, fruits, vegetables, cotton; beef, pork, poultry, dairy products; forest products; fish
Exports - commodities: capital goods, automobiles, industrial supplies and raw materials, consumer goods, agricultural products
Imports - commodities: crude oil and refined petroleum products, machinery, automobiles, consumer goods, industrial raw materials, food and beverages
Historic exchange rates:
Jan 2002 2001 2000 1999 1998 1997 British pounds per U.S. dollar 0.6981 0.6944 0.6596 0.6180 0.6037 0.6106 Canadian dollars per U.S. dollar 1.6003 1.5488 1.4851 1.4857 1.4835 1.3846 French francs per U.S. dollar — — — 5.65 5.8995 5.8367 Italian lire per U.S. dollar — — — 1,668.7 1,763.2 1,703.1 Japanese yen per U.S. dollar 132.66 121.53 107.77 113.91 130.91 120.99 German deutsche marks per U.S. dollar — — — 1.69 1.9692 1.7341 Euros per US dollar 1.1324 1.1175 1.08540 0.93863 Note: financial institutions in France, Italy, Germany, and eight other European countries started using the euro on 1 January 1999, with the euro replacing the local currency for all transactions in 2002. Their 1999 figures are for January.
See also
References
- Bureau of Economic Analysis Historical Gross Domestic Product Estimates
- US Bureau of Labor Statistics Employment status of the civilian noninstitutional population, 1940 to date
External links
- CIA - The World Factbook - United States
- Outline of the U.S. Economy
- U.S. Census Bureau
- U.S. Dept of Labor - Bureau of Labor Statistics
- U.S. Dept of Commerce - Bureau of Economic Analysis
- FRB: Z.1 Release-- Flow of Funds Accounts of the United States, Release Dates
- OECD's United States country Web site and OECD Economic Survey of the United States
- U.S. Energy Information Administration
- U.S. Dept of Labor - Bureau of Labor Statistics - Table 4. second quarter 2005(2)
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