trade gap

noun

British, finance
: a situation in which a country buys more from other countries than it sells to other countries : the amount of money by which a country's imports are greater than its exports

Examples of trade gap in a Sentence

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But tariffs haven’t proven successful at narrowing the trade gap: Despite the Trump-Biden import taxes, the deficit rose last year to $918 billion, second-highest on record. Christopher Rugaber, Chicago Tribune, 15 Feb. 2025 Some would address national security concerns while others would be aimed at closing the U.S. trade gap with other nations, BMO Capital Markets wrote in a note to clients. Paul Davidson, USA TODAY, 6 Feb. 2025 Trump is imprecisely talking about the trade gap, the difference between what America exports and imports. Cnn.com, The Mercury News, 3 Feb. 2025 That trade gap widened significantly in the 1990s as globalization accelerated, the American economy boomed and consumers and businesses purchased more from abroad. Alicia Wallace, CNN, 16 Jan. 2025 Despite the upswing in apparel and textile imports, the U.S. actually narrowed its overall trade gap in October by nearly 12 percent, to $73.8 billion, from the previous month, according to the U.S. Commerce Department’s Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA). Kate Nishimura, Sourcing Journal, 3 Sep. 2019 The economy picked up sharply in the second quarter, as a rise in consumer and business spending offset a drop in housing construction and a widening trade gap. Paul Davidson, USA TODAY, 31 July 2024 That widened the trade gap and slowed economic growth overall. Paul Davidson, USA TODAY, 25 Apr. 2024 Instead of narrowing the trade gap, the tariffs have coincided with a widening of the U.S. trade deficit with China: by nearly 12 percent in 2018 (to $420 billion) and by about another eight percent in the first eight months of this year. Weijian Shan, Foreign Affairs, 8 Oct. 2019

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“Trade gap.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/trade%20gap. Accessed 22 Feb. 2025.

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