The United States will have one trade surplus with a top 10 trade partner when 2021 annual data is released next week, the United Kingdom.
That deficit is shrinking, however. While U.S. trade with the world is growing at three times the rate of United Kingdom trade, U.S. exports to the world are growing at seven times the rate of those to the United Kingdom.
The U.S. surplus stood at $5.11 billion through November, down from more than $9 billion in 2020 and the lowest surplus since 2017.
That’s according to U.S. Census Bureau data through November, the latest available. Annual data is released next week.
Overall United Kingdom trade is up 7.63% from pandemic-hobbled 2020 but U.S. trade is up 21.93%, almost three times as fast. With exports, those to the United Kingdom have increased 3.37% while overall U.S. exports to the world are up 22.79%, or almost seven times as rapidly.
While the United Kingdom will finish as the nation’s seventh most important trade partner for the ninth consecutive year, its trade will remain further below pre-pandemic 2019 levels than any other top 10 trade partner. Through November, it was down 11.51% from the same 11-month period of 2019, while U.S. trade was up 9.67%.
This is the seventh in a series of columns focused on each of the United States’ top 10 trade partners. I previously wrote a column about Mexico, currently the nation’s top-ranked trade partner, Canada, China, Japan, Germany and South Korea.
After this analysis of the United Kingdom are posts about No. 8 Taiwan, No. 9 India and No. 10 Vietnam. These 10 account for two-thirds of all U.S. trade, with just the top three at better than 43% this year.
I wrote a similar series of columns about the nation’s top 10 ports — the top-ranked Port of Los Angeles, Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, Port Laredo in Texas, New York’s JFK International, the Port of Newark, the Port of Houston, Detroit’s Ambassador Bridge, Los Angeles International Airport and the Port of Savannah.
All are based on my analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data, which I have been slicing and dicing for two decades.
The leading U.S. export the last three years has been gold, presumably headed for London, one of the world’s leading financial markets along with New York and Tokyo. Those exports are down 20.48% through November, which is equal to $2.04 billion. However, the 2020 total was a record-setting total, at least the seventh in a row.
The second most valuable U.S. export YTD is aircraft and some non-engine parts, which have been halved since the 2018 total of $10.52 billion through November. This is the third consecutive year of a decline in the category.
Oil is the third-leading export to the United Kingdom through November but the most valuable for the month of November. Unlike gold and aircraft, it is at a record-setting pace for the fourth year in the last five.
On the import side, passenger vehicles are the leading import but are at their lowest level since 2014, excluding he pandemic-impacted year of 2020. The value is up 14.70% from 2020, slightly faster than overall imports, but down 30.99% from 2019, which is almost three times the decline of overall imports to the United Kingdom.
These imports are almost twice as valuable as the second- and third-ranked imports, returned exports and medicines in individual doses, both of which topped $3 billion through November. Returned exports, in this case without change, is a broad category of commodities returned for a variety of reasons.
Three U.S. gateways for trade with the United Kingdom have trade up more than $1 billion from 2020: Salt Lake City International Airport (gold exports), Chicago O”Hare International (medical and aviation trade) and Port of Corpus Christi (oil exports). Two of those are up more than $1 billion from 2019 — Salt Lake and Corpus Christi.
Taking it on the chin has been the top-ranked U.S. gateway for trade with the United Kingdom, JKF International Airport, down 15.22% from 2020 and 28.89% from 2019. A steep decline in the value of gold sent there is the culprit.
