Comment by bluGill

Comment by bluGill 2 days ago

2 replies

We are not only measuring in dollars. We measure tons of steel, number of cars produced and so on. Not all of those measures are growing, but many are. While market share has gone down, total production is up.

Take cars - https://www.bts.gov/content/annual-us-motor-vehicle-producti... US production is up greatly in 2019 (that is before Covid - the chart doesn't have after Covid numbers to work with). US production is up by a lot since 1960. However in 1960 the US population was lower, and your typical family only had one car (women often didn't even have a drivers license). Thus you see market share is down while production is up.

_heimdall 2 days ago

The ratio of domestic sales and domestic production has widened over the same period. In 1970 the ratio of domestic production to domestic sales was .933, in 2019 that ratio is .796.

Though we are making more total cars, were making a smaller percentage of all cars sold.

As another commenter pointed out, the cars we make today are amalgamation of parts and design work done overseas. That isn't necessarily a bad thing if you view globalization favorably, but it is another factor when considering the value created in the US with regards to vehicle production.

treis 2 days ago

Eh this is bending the word "produced". In 1960 all the parts were made in the US likely from raw materials mined & refined in the US. That's very different from today.