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Continued Weakening of U.S. Economic Position in the Capitalist World

Major economic statistics of European countries and the Untied States


[This short unsigned article is reprinted from Peking Review,
#9, Feb. 26, 1965, p. 25. It seems to be a sidebar to the article
“Why U.S. Opposes a Return to the Gold Standard”.]


SINCE the late 1950s, the balance of economic strength among the European imperialist countries and the United States has steadily changed in favour of France and West Germany to the detriment of Britain and particularly of the United States. This finds its clearest expression in the weakening of the U.S. international financial position, as shown in the following tables.

I. Changes in the industrial production, export trade and gold and foreign exchange reserves of European countries and the United States expressed in percentages of capitalist world totals.



 Industrial
Production1		 Export
Trade2		 Gold and Foreign
Exchange Reserve3

1957 1963 1964
(1st
quarter)		 1957 1963 1964
(1st 6
months)		 1957
(Dec.)		 1963
(Dec.)		 1964
(End of
June)
U.S. 47.30 43.58 43.30 20.6 17.2 17.3 40.6 24.2 24.0
Britain 8.90 7.77 7.88 9.6 8.7 8.5 4.2 4.1 4.1
Common Mkt. Six 19.45 21.05 21.47 22.5 27.8 28.1 13.6* 28.0* 27.9*
France 5.22 5.64 5.75 5.1 5.9 6.1 1.1 6.8 7.2
W. Germany 8.33 8.73 8.95 8.5 10.8 10.7 9.1 10.9 10.9
Italy 3.10 4.04 4.00 2.5 3.7 3.8 2.4 4.9 4.5

Sources: 1. Calculated according to the Economic Review of the British National Institute Of Economic and Social Research; 2. Calculated according to the journal Foreign Trade of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development; 3. All except asterisks are calculated from the International Financial Statistics of the International Monetary Fund; * Figures for the gold reserves of the Common Market Six taken from the General Statistics of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.


II.Changes in international payments and gold and foreign exchange reserves of European countries and the United States. (Unit: 100 million U.S. dollars.)



 International Payments
Surplus (+), Deficits(-)		 Gold and Foreign
Exchange Reserve*
Increase (+), Decrease (-)

1958-63 1964 1958-63 1964
(1st 3
quarters)
U.S. -183.70*1 -25.70*6 -70.49 +0.62
W. Europe +124.03*2
+154.13*2 +7.26
Britain -10.75*3 -22.40*7 +3.84 -1.17
France +52.20*4 +2.55*6
(1st 6
months) 		+40.86 +5.83*8
(The whole
year)
W. Germany +17.69*5 -5.84*5
(1st 3
quarters) 		+29.98 -0.42

Sources: *1. Survey of Current Business of the U.S. Department of Commerce; *2. Report on Western Europe of the Chase Manhattan Bank; *3. British Monthly Digest of Statistics; *4. From British journals, the Times, the Banker, the Economist; *5. West German Monatsberichte der Deutschen Bundesbank; *6. Estimated by the London Financial Times; *7. Estimated by the British Government; *8. The French Bulletin Mensuel de Statistique, and Le Figaro; * All figures not marked with footnotes are based upon the General Statistics of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.



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