Warren Buffett Quotes

During the 1999 debate over Permanent Normal Trade Relations with China President Bill Clinton said, 'In opening the economy of China, the agreement will create unprecedented opportunities for American farmers, workers and companies to compete successfully in China's market. WRONG: Our trade deficit with China has increased from $83 billion in 2001 to a record breaking $342 billion in 2014.

The U. S. trade deficit with China shows that while we value the potential of their market, they value the reality of our market. It is in this area that we should use our leverage.

I think that trade is an important issue. Of course, we are 5 percent of the world's population; we have to trade with the other 95 percent. And we need to have smart, fair trade deals.

Remember, it was Bill Clinton who signed NAFTA, one of the worst economic deals ever made by our country or, frankly, any other country. Never, ever again.

Historically, large-scale global trade has served two functions: 1) the exchange of goods between willing sellers and buyers described in Econ 101 textbooks; 2) as a tool of state aggrandizement, in which the private parties are stand-ins for governmental interests.

Today, we have a trade regime which has led to the largest trade deficits this country has ever experienced.

In order to address world economic imbalances, countries around the world should make joint efforts to adjust their economic structure.

Nearly every one of the foreign financial crises of recent decades has led to an increase in the U. S. trade deficit.

Wealthy nations cannot grow richer unless they have customers beyond their border.

By definition, by reducing our trade deficit we will be hurting consumers. Consumers are always better off with a trade deficit.

Our international trade relations, though vastly important, are in point of time and necessity, secondary to the establishment of a sound national economy. I favor as a practical policy the putting of first things first.

We are the world's biggest importer. We need to treat the other countries as good suppliers.

The E.U., China, and Japan all talk free trade, and they all practice protectionism.

More travel to America would lower our trade and budget deficits.

We cannot talk about trade without talking about China.

Chile is a country that sells cheap and buys expensive, because we have to pay for manufactured goods from countries at much higher levels of development.

That's the kind of thinking that our country needs. When we have a country that's doing so badly, that's being ripped off by every single country in the world, it's the kind of thinking that our country needs, because everybody, we have a trade deficit with all of the countries that we do business with, of almost $800 billion a year.

The rest of the world really likes our stuff pretty well. It's just we buy so damn much of what they produce.

I think that the important point is we've got to have a president who understands the benefits of free trade but also is going to enforce unfair trade agreements and is going to stand up to other countries.

We are trading away a little bit of our country all the time for this access consumption that we have over what we've produced. That is not good. I think it's terrible over time. But our country's productive grows enough so we actually can do that, and we'll still be better off. We just don't be as well off as if we hadn't done it.

Ann and I will carry out this equivocal message to the world: Markets must be open.

If we start thinking simply nationally, and we start having policies that try and restrict the benefits only within our borders, and try and implement protectionist measures as a consequence, this will not have the effect we need to have on the global economy. And that's ultimately the global economy that's pulling most of us down, particularly countries like Canada, that aren't the source of these current economic troubles.

I truly believe that America's greatness and billions and billions of dollars of our wealth flows away because China doesn't treat us fairly.

[Barack] Obama administration, the [George W.]Bush administration have done nothing. And as China has manipulated its currency, we've lost trillions of dollars of wealth and millions of good-paying jobs.

When they talk about raising your taxes, I think raise the taxes on some of these countries that are taking advantage of the United States.