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(Economist) Unlikely Earth is running a current-account surplus with extra-terrestrials   (economist.com) divider line 22
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2416 clicks; posted to Business » on 17 Nov 2011 at 12:25 PM   |  Favorite    |   share:  Share on Twitter share via Email Share on Facebook   more»   |    Get this fabulous T-Shirt and impress the methane out of your friends! shirt it!



22 Comments   (+0 »)
   
 
abb3w [TotalFark]
2011-11-17 09:27:02 AM
Looks like someone's found a subtle way of pointing out how much China has been cooking the books.
 
make me some tea [TotalFark]
2011-11-17 09:31:23 AM
abb3w: Looks like someone's found a subtle way of pointing out how much China has been cooking the books.

I'm thinking Greece's fiscal shenanigans are the tip o' the iceberg here.
 
ZAZ [TotalFark]
2011-11-17 09:41:04 AM
Interesting. Do countries ever get together and do a simultaneous deep audit of multinational corporations to make sure their international balances are consistent?
 
Thoroughly With Foil
2011-11-17 12:49:15 PM
Simple answer: Pimp my Space-station. Duh.
 
Azmodan Kijur
2011-11-17 01:02:07 PM
The interesting thing here is the choice that is given as the reason behind the discrepancy. Though they are only examples, using the US and China as the examples is not likely accidental. Either the US is understating their debts or China is overstating its surpluses. Which one do you believe? The nation with a Treasury Board that counts and maintains the debt numbers or the nation with a centrally controlled economy that controls money tightly? Both have an incentive to lie, technically speaking, but which one is more capable of actually doing so?
 
make me some tea [TotalFark]
2011-11-17 01:04:47 PM
Azmodan Kijur: The interesting thing here is the choice that is given as the reason behind the discrepancy. Though they are only examples, using the US and China as the examples is not likely accidental. Either the US is understating their debts or China is overstating its surpluses. Which one do you believe? The nation with a Treasury Board that counts and maintains the debt numbers or the nation with a centrally controlled economy that controls money tightly? Both have an incentive to lie, technically speaking, but which one is more capable of actually doing so?

China is far less transparent and far more authoritarian than the United States is (although we're working on it), so I'd go with China on the heavy side of that.
 
Boatmech
2011-11-17 01:28:33 PM
TL;DR:
Global economists know the information they receive is inaccurate. It doesn't matter because no modern government will base their monetary policies on accurate information.

(Fark Trolls)
tHe WORLD eXported $331 Billions mORE than It iNported in 2010!!!!
OH MY GOD!! we be paying our alien overlords $7oo Billion by 2014!!!

(Follow up)
The Rent is too Damn high!
Both sides are bad so vote AOP!
(Alien Overlords Party)
 
TheGreatGazoo
2011-11-17 02:00:22 PM
Does that mean I need to run out and get my stuffing for Thanksgiving?
 
RoyBatty
2011-11-17 02:17:29 PM
"current account" is one of those stupid jargon phrases economists make up to ensure no one without a class in macroeconomics has any idea of what they are talking about. And even then, people with only a few courses will promptly forget it.
 
Mad Canadian
2011-11-17 02:40:37 PM
Whar Aliens? Whar?
 
Azmodan Kijur
2011-11-17 02:41:54 PM
make me some tea: Azmodan Kijur: The interesting thing here is the choice that is given as the reason behind the discrepancy. Though they are only examples, using the US and China as the examples is not likely accidental. Either the US is understating their debts or China is overstating its surpluses. Which one do you believe? The nation with a Treasury Board that counts and maintains the debt numbers or the nation with a centrally controlled economy that controls money tightly? Both have an incentive to lie, technically speaking, but which one is more capable of actually doing so?

China is far less transparent and far more authoritarian than the United States is (although we're working on it), so I'd go with China on the heavy side of that.

I tend to agree. The US Treasury has a lot of eyes on it, national and international, so I imagine that it is more difficult for them to cook the books. Cooking them requires them to misreport the debt numbers . When you are at 14.5 trillion, it doesn't seem like a big deal to admit to another 300 billion. Depends on the timing, but still.
 
BolloxReader
2011-11-17 02:58:30 PM
I was hoping an economist was going to put forward a proposition that life originated on Mars, and thus we MUST colonize Mars in order to even out the surplus in life. "China's been 'shopping their economy, I can tell by the pixels" is disappointingly pedestrian.
 
malle-herbert
2011-11-17 03:28:15 PM
Spacecash !
 
DammitIForgotMyLogin [TotalFark]
2011-11-17 04:14:41 PM
Well, I for one can't think of a single economic sector which relies on moving enormous quantities of goods any moneys across international borders without anybody in authority knowing what exactly what's going on


But, if there were such a thing, it might seriously distort these sort of figures.
 
USCLaw2010
2011-11-17 04:32:04 PM
But are the economists actually saying that it's aliens?
 
abb3w [TotalFark]
2011-11-17 05:41:42 PM
make me some tea: I'm thinking Greece's fiscal shenanigans are the tip o' the iceberg here.

I don't think Greece lied about their present state, but merely gave overly optimistic projections on future trends. I could be wrong; I haven't followed that mess very closely.

But there's another China thread going, if that's what you mean.

Azmodan Kijur: When you are at 14.5 trillion, it doesn't seem like a big deal to admit to another 300 billion.

Of course, when you're playing with numbers like 14.5 trillion, the 300 billion might just be a few rounding errors.

I think China shenanigans are more likely, however.
 
Franco
2011-11-17 06:08:40 PM
This seems to validate the Chinese recession article from yesterday.

/Did you hear that popping sound?
//I think the great bubble of China just burst.
///We are $#%^ed.
 
twat_waffle
2011-11-17 06:14:12 PM
troll.me
 
struct [TotalFark]
2011-11-17 06:57:11 PM
make me some tea: Azmodan Kijur: The interesting thing here is the choice that is given as the reason behind the discrepancy. Though they are only examples, using the US and China as the examples is not likely accidental. Either the US is understating their debts or China is overstating its surpluses. Which one do you believe? The nation with a Treasury Board that counts and maintains the debt numbers or the nation with a centrally controlled economy that controls money tightly? Both have an incentive to lie, technically speaking, but which one is more capable of actually doing so?

China is far less transparent and far more authoritarian than the United States is (although we're working on it), so I'd go with China on the heavy side of that.

I second that, with the caveat that U.S. multinationals do some really shady things with reporting for tax purpose, reshuffling things around and such. But yeah, China's books are cooked. This bubbles going to pop one day, and its going to pop really, really big.
 
beelzebubba76
2011-11-17 09:59:50 PM
That's it, man. Game over, man. Game over, what the fark are we supposed to now, huh, what are we gonna do?
 
wildcardjack
2011-11-17 10:23:21 PM
What is this, Weekly World News?
 
8 inches [TotalFark]
2011-11-18 01:52:19 AM
twat_waffle: [troll.me image 553x484]

I was SOOOOO waiting for this! Thanks!
 
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