Two rich men ate dog shit and ate trillions of dollars of GDP of the United States
In 2022, China's GDP accounted for 70.7 percent of the U.S. GDP, and by 2023, it will drop to 64.3 percent. Some people wonder why the U.S. economy has not been booming this year, but why its GDP has increased so much. For one reason or another, US GDP is all water.
Many years ago, there was a joke on the Internet, saying that two rich men went out and saw a dog on the roadside, and rich man A said to rich man B, If you dare to eat this dog, I will give you 50 million dollars. Millionaire B couldn't stand the provocation, so he ate the dog, so millionaire A had to give him 50 million dollars.
After giving the two men were silent. Millionaire A did not think that the other party would really eat, causing himself to lose 50 million for no reason. Millionaire B regrets that he is too impulsive, obviously not short of money, but by a person to eat the dog.
Fortunately, at this time, he saw a pile of dog arrows next to him, and said to A, if you dare to eat, I will also give you 50 million. After a little hesitation, he still ate, and then successfully took back 50 million.
But after this two people more depressed, any benefit did not get, but a person ate a piece of dog. A passing economist who learned what had happened loudly praised the two men and said: "Great, you have created $100 million of GDP for the United States!"
This is a joke, but it is a true picture of US GDP. In 2022, the GDP of the United States will be 25.74 trillion US dollars, of which the primary industry agriculture will be 288.9 billion US dollars, accounting for 1%, the secondary industry will be 4.64 billion US dollars, accounting for 16%, and the tertiary industry will be 20.45 trillion yuan, accounting for 83%.
The vast majority of the 20.45 trillion GDP of the tertiary industry is inflated, large and useless, or even virtual. Like virtual rent. While all major countries in the world count virtual rents, the United States uses the market price method, and this item alone accounts for 8% of U.S. GDP, more than four times that of China.
In 2022, litigation costs in the United States will reach $1.54 trillion, or 6% of GDP. After the death of Floyd, who was kneeled to the ground by the US police a few years ago and could not breathe, his family sued for compensation under the encouragement of his lawyer, and finally won $27 million, and then the legal team smiled and mentioned $21.7 million.
Had it not been for the prodding of lawyers, his family would not have sued, and the $21.7 million GDP would not have been created for the United States. In addition to legal fees, there are $334 billion in legal fees, accounting for 1.3% of GDP, and the entire legal industry generates 7.3% of GDP in the United States.
Health care costs account for 17% of GDP in the United States, but this does not change the reality that the United States has the lowest life expectancy in the developed world.
In addition, the United States only 21.5 billion express delivery a year, China is 115 billion, but the United States express delivery industry GDP is 1998-billion US dollars, China is only 153.1 billion US dollars. China builds six times as many new buildings a year as the United States, uses 13 times as much steel and 22 times as much cement, but the value added in our construction industry is only $1982bn, compared with $272.5bn in the United States.
What's more, the US can change its GDP numbers at will. For example, the GDP in 2022 was originally 25.46 trillion US dollars, and later the Ministry of Commerce said that the statistical method was wrong, and it was changed to 25.74 trillion US dollars, an increase of 280 billion US dollars.
$280 billion, equivalent to Finland's annual GDP, would rank 48th in the world. It can be seen that the GDP of the United States has a lot of water, most of it is as useless GDP as two rich men eating dog arrows.
We are under the impression that useful GDP is to produce real goods, such as agricultural products and industrial products, because service GDP is imaginary, in the event of economic crisis or war, it will be halved or even reduced to zero. GDP is reassuring only when it produces real things.
The GDP of this kind of physical production is only 4.91 trillion yuan in the United States and 8.01 trillion yuan in China, which is 1.6 times that of the United States. In terms of purchasing power parity, China surpassed the US in 2014 and was 1.7 times the US last year. If you take the water out of US GDP, US GDP is about 70% of our GDP, which is the real number.