The USA Trade Deficit, known by some as "Exorbitant Priviliedge."

...Look at the figure, (click here) showing America's net exports: measured net exports have been negative--often substantially negative--for nearly three decades. Some of these large trade deficits are the result of domestic economic mismanagement (the very large trade deficits of the mid to late 1980s were, in large part, consequences of the disastrously-botched fiscal policy that was the Reagan deficit). Some of these large trade deficits are the result of foreign economic mismanagement (the very, very large trade deficits of the late 1990s and early 2000s are in large part the result of insufficient demand and high unemployment in many of our major trading partners). Some of these large trade deficits are simply not there: the result of errors and omissions in the data that fail to capture a substantial amount of U.S. service and other exports (how much? Ah, now that is an interesting question)....