Global Trade Forecast Released

Today, as a bit of a change I thought I’d update my forecast for the global trade deficit for 2013. There was some concern that a deficit might develop in 2012 if I were to start charging for advice. Once I explained that advanced planets have phased out money and I don't charge for advice that concern has now passed. Consequently, the latest forecast for the global trade surplus/deficit for 2013 remains at zero. While there may be some further spacecraft launches none of them yet has any external commercial purpose and so will not generate any surplus and you have not yet entered into any commercial arrangement with another planet that could lead to a deficit

The leisure index, another key economic indicator of those not currently employed, looks likely to remain fairly elevated throughout 2013. Deleveraging and debt restructuring tends to reduce the sustainable market price for labour and this reduction in expected returns, combined with previous anchoring at higher wage levels will probably lead to unhappy unemployment for some time to come. This remains disappointing given the rather sub-standard state of most of your software at present and the major remaining limtiations to your scientific knowledge especially in life sciences. The general state of the planet also remains poor to awful in many areas, so there really is no shortage of things that could be getting worked on.

 



On a more positive note however irrespective of the level of debt or derivative financial instruments in force I can confirm that none of the 2014 harvest or rainfall will be consumed during 2013. Global warming seems likely to continue and this will certainly make habitation in northern latitudes a little easier. It will still be quite a few years before much of Greenland becomes habitable but improvements in crop development should allow cereal production to spread slowly north over time and this should increase global food supply.

 

GDP isn’t a measure I even bother to review however progress on global life expectancy still seems unacceptably slow and rising food prices are exacerbating the problems of poverty for many. If only someone would come up with a global strategy to prioritise the actions required for progress.  There is much work to do to achieve the 2020 vision of global life expectancy at 80 in 8 years time.