Here are the top 20 countries we import from:
China makes up 13% of the total. Here are exports:
What is the Netherlands doing at #4? What do we export to them?
Nothing special, it turns out. Lubricants, machinery, chemicals, and miscellaneous manufactured articles make up 90% of it. I'm not sure why the Dutch are such big importers of US goods relative to their size, but we thank them for their patronage.
The Dutch have the port of Rotterdam, the tenth biggest port in the world, and the largest outside east Asia. We also have a large number of companies involved with trade. Without looking up the data on specifics, what is relevant to the question is that a lot of imports end up being traded on to elsewhere, particularly elsewhere in Europe.
It’s not really valid to consider EU countries separately, since once something enters the zone it could go anywhere. Rotterdam is the biggest port in our third biggest trading partner.
☝🏻☝🏻☝🏻
Yeah, basically most of what we send to the EU goes there. All US>EU exported Tesla, for instance (to take from the next article). Tho they get most of their Tesla from China and Germany now.
Belgium is probably in the same situation, given that Antwerp is another major port in a small EU country.
BEA has different numbers, seasonally adjusted.
I’m Dutch…the Netherlands punches above its weight in a number of industries.
I'm surprised Bangladesh does not show up, considering the garment industry there. I guess the dollars are just too small.
Hence so few exports to Mexico, for instance, compared to Canada.
They're also on the other side of the world and the likes of Honduras, Guatemala etc. have much cheaper shipping costs.
The Netherlands has huge, modern shipping facilities, so it is the shipping destination for goods from the U.S. that are distributed all over Europe
Yes, but then why is it high on the export destination list and not on the import one? My guess would be that the US exports lots of bulk goods to Europe (Rotterdam being the destination as far as it's concerned, but not where the goods end up) and imports brand goods which are considered to come from where they are produced, never mind which ports they pass through. But I don't know that.
Export goods are put in a container where it's made in a 'port' that might be landlocked and even if it goes through the Netherlands, it's not counted.
But Import goods are counted where the container is cracked open, which is usually the port area, hence Netherlands.
This is true of US goods as well. They're exported from their states but usually imported to a state with a port,
ASML, which makes photolithography equipment for chipmakers, incorporates lots of third-party components. I don't know about hardware, but there's probably a lot of US software in the mix.
Netherlands leads the world the tools that etch high-end silicon wafers.