Remember trade deficits? They don’t talk about them anymore like they used to do, even if the bottom line is a deficit means you are losing your relative wealth to those with a surplus, you can still get richer if you run a trade deficit.
Yet after decades of deficit the gap between a country like the U.K., and for that matter the U.S., and the rest of the world narrows and ultimately the surplus countries end up richer and come calling to buy up your assets. After decade after decade of trade deficits, the U.K. is being hollowed out. If you want a good example of this hollowing, simply look at the prime real estate in London. It is owned by the overseas rich. Look abroad and you will not see such prime real estate owned by the British. How many U.K. companies get snapped up by overseas corporations? When was the last time a U.K. company took over a big or even a medium sized foreign company?
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