Statistics

U.S. exports advance broadly, from airplanes to corn to tractors to gold

March 19th, 2007

Almost 200 export categories topped $1 billion in value in 2006, according to WorldCity analysis of Census data, as the United States surpassed $1 trillion in exports for the first time ever.
The 198 categories account for about 15 percent of all categories at that level of Census data. The previous year the total was 177.
Overall, exports increased 14.5 percent while imports increased 10.9 percent even though the deficit reached an all-time high of $818 billion.
The single biggest export gain was in aircraft, which jumped $13.6 billion, or 42.4 percent, to $45.5 billion. That, of course, means Boeing. Just a few years ago, Airbus was ascendant and Boeing was down in the dumps. What a difference a few years can make. Because of Boeing’s turnaround, aircraft repeated as the No. 2-ranked export from the United States in 2006.
Among the leading exports, the biggest gainer was gold, which increased more than 53 percent to $7.4 billion.
Other big gains, all in excess of $1 billion, were registered by corn, petroleum, computer motherboards, heavy construction equipment, jewelry and artwork.

“The focus on the trade deficit, which continues to swell, often overlooks the tremendous gains the United States has made in finding international markets for its products,” said WorldCity President Ken Roberts. “Some of that is cyclical in nature gold and oil-related products, for example but more often than not it is U.S. companies taking advantage of a global economy that is delivering real results not just for the world’s biggest nations but the world’s developing nations as well.”
Twelve nations purchased more than $1 billion in aircraft from the United States in 2006, including No. 1 China and No. 2 the United Arab Emirates, which both purchased more than $5 billion. China is a source of friction among those concerned about the U.S. trade deficit and the United Arab Emirates was in the news in 2006 as a U.A.E. company, Dubai Ports World, bought an interest in terminal operations at U.S. ports as well as others around the world from a British company. Dubai Ports World recently sold its U.S. interests, profitably.
The other nations purchasing more than $1 billion in U.S. aircraft in 2006 were Japan, South Korea, which like China are nations with which the United States has a large trade deficit, Singapore, France, Ireland, Canada, Mexico, India, Turkey and Brazil.
Brazil had not purchased $1 billion in U.S. aircraft in the previous three years combined, nor had Turkey, nor India. Mexico’s previous high was $767 million in 2005; it nearly doubled that total in 2006 to $1.5 billion. South Korea’s total was nearly double as well.
Trade statistics from Census can be analyzed with relative levels of specificity from a very general two-digit coding to a very specific 10-digit coding. For this article and most WorldCity analysis, the four-digit level of coding was used. There are roughly 1,265 categories at this level of definition.

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