Last year, the United States launched trade and tariff battles with, among others, the European Union, Canada, Mexico, Korea, Japan and China (with whom the US had the largest deficit).   The US had basis for its dissatisfactions, but the frameworks need to evolve to newer models to achieve an improved trading system for the US and the world with lower risks. Why?

– As a measure of the flows and sustainability of the financial health of a country in the global economic system, the goods deficits have become a poor measure given that trade in services has exceeded that of goods already, and current methods are an inaccurate gauge even of the goods flows.