[Willie Green]

You are conveniently forgetting to mention that when imports (which are subtracted from GDP) are purchased, the value of the purchase is ADDED to consumption in GDP, so in the net there is no loss to GDP.

Production creates wealth.
Consumption diminishes wealth.

If you produce more than you consume, you get wealthy.
If you consume more than you produce, you go broke.

What don't you understand about that?

[Toddsterpatriot]

If you produce more than you consume, you get wealthy. If you consume more than you produce, you go broke.

God knows I hate to agree with Willie, but he's right.

From his post #1:
Gross domestic product (GDP)............................. $11,728.0 billion
Net exports of goods and services........................... -609.3 (-5.19% of GDP)

So by Willies logic, we produced over 19 times in GDP what we consumed in net exports.