United States — Balance of Payments

The United States has run a current-account deficit in almost every year since the early 1980s. The deficit is overwhelmingly a goods story — the U.S. imports far more merchandise than it exports — only partly offset by surpluses in services and in primary income on its foreign investments.^[1]

Decomposed into its components, the widening of the deficit from the mid-1990s is visible in the goods balance, while services and income have remained broadly supportive.

Because the balance of payments must balance, the current-account deficit is the mirror image of a financial-account surplus: the rest of the world's net acquisition of U.S. assets.

Two episodes dominate the post-war record — the Nixon Shock that ended Bretton Woods, and the post-NAFTA, post-China-WTO expansion of the goods deficit.

1. U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (2025). International Transactions Accounts (BPM6). BEA. link.