Comment by Aachen

> How many aircraft can the world need that it commonly tops the export chart of the wealthiest country?!

Consider how many American companies exclusively manufacture in the far east.

If a European buys a product "made by" Apple or nvidia or Nike or Levis - that's not an American export, it's an export of Indonesia, China, Vietnam, Taiwan, or wherever. America still gets the profits, though.

> How many aircraft can the world need that it commonly tops the export chart of the wealthiest country?

Airliners and military aircraft are expensive. Consider that nearly the entire aircraft production capacity of Boeing and Lockheed-Martin as well as the engine production capacity of GE and P&W are booked for years to come. Also, unlike Airbus which has multiple final assembly plants across the world, Boeing only does final assembly in the US.

A single airliner can be half a billion dollars. That's about 1/4000th of the US's total goods exported in a single item.

Because in-patent pharmaceuticals are a LOT more expensive than out of patent ones their monetary value is far greater than the greater volume of out of patent pharmaceuticals. If you look at where big pharma makes its revenues and their sales relative to generics sellers you can see this. Because of that the cost of making them is not really that important.

As for aircraft, not that many in number, but very expensive things with very expensive parts.

Goods versus services. We tend to use the word “exports” to refer to only the former in America, which is anachronistic.