In 1950, America's top exports were cotton and grains; big imports ranged from coffee and rubber to newsprint, sugar and wool. By 2000, the big exports were sophisticated manufactures like computer parts, airplanes and semiconductor chips, while the main imports were cars, oil, computers, semiconductors and clothes. But as manufactured goods overtook natural resource and agricultural products for the top spots, trade in intangible 'services' grew even faster. Worldwide, from 1990 to 2002, global services trade rose from $290 billion to $740 billion -- growing nearly twice as fast as manufacturing trade and four times faster than farm trade. So by 2050, top-five lists might include TV shows, computer software, bank loans, legal briefs and Global Positioning Service data (or perhaps more likely, their still-to-be-invented descendants).
For now, goods trade is still much bigger than services trade. (Worldwide, exports of manufactured goods, agriculture and energy totaled $6.5 trillion in 2002, or about nine times services exports; for the US, last year's $710 billion in goods exports was about two and a half times the $280 billion in services exports.) But services are closing the gap rapidly. Last year, American schools 'exported' $13 billion worth of education services to 586,000 foreign students, passing our $12 billion in grain exports for the second year in a row. American software companies, meanwhile, earned $5 billion from overseas sales (though high-tech firms worry about low rates of graduating IT doctorates and engineers, and workers fear 'offshoring' of software design to lower-cost countries). Hollywood actors and film studios earned $10 billion in overseas film and videotape rentals; rock stars brought in half a billion from copyright royalties, while overseas concerts and sports exhibitions raised $175 million.
Internationally, America ranks first as a services exporter; Britain is second at $84 billion, while Hong Kong, Ireland, the Netherlands and Singapore fare especially well relative to population. India is the developing-world leader with $18 billion in services exports, through heavy sales of software, back-office services and Bollywood movies. If current rates of growth were to continue indefinitely, America's services exports would exceed goods exports by 2037, and services imports would top goods imports by the mid-2040s. The world as a whole would pass the tipping point sometime after mid-century.
PPI looks at changes in American trade patterns since the Second World War:
http://www.ppionline.org/ppi_ci.cfm?
knlgAreaID=108&subsecID=206&contentID=3876
The Commerce Department's Bureau of Economic Analysis provides statistics on US services trade trends since 1986:
http://www.bea.doc.gov/bea/
di/1001serv/intlserv.htm
The WTO offers global statistics through 2002 for both goods and services:
http://www.wto.org/english/res_e/
statis_e/its2003_e/its03_toc_e.htm
U.S. Trade Representative page for services trade, summarizing services trade negotiating proposals at the WTO:
http://www.ustr.gov/sectors/services/docsvcs.shtml
India and China, with 75,000 and 65,000 students at U.S. universities for the 2003-2004 school year, are the top two sources of exchange students; Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Mexico, Canada, Indonesia and Thailand follow. About 160,000 American students are abroad this year. The Institute for International Education reports on foreign students in the United States and Americans abroad:
http://opendoors.iienetwork.org/
