[woobilicious]

You're looking an a macro economic indicator that only politicians seem to care about, Most other countries don't even bother to measure it.

Trade deficit is just as much an indicator for foreign sentiment to hold US cash, as it is to import non-US made stuff.

All that indicator says is that consumer behavior changes during a recession.

You can argue the same thing with private debt.

https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/private-debt-to-g...

https://www.econlib.org/library/Columns/y2017/KleinBoudreaux...