We're Number Two, we're Number Two!!...

During my life, many of the areas of dominance for American business have shifted. Case in point: commerical aircraft construction was an American monopoply after Aeroflot folded.

Then came Airbus. To be sure, US plane manufacturers (OK, Boeing) are battling back and Airbus has proven to be just as prone to bad management as any company, but still the trend is clear.

We have real competition for commercial space launches, we are not even in the game for shipbuilding, taller skyscrapers are going up around the world, we are slipping in health statistics like infant mortality and longevity, and the Olympic basketball trophy isn't automatically inscribed with "US".

I know, I know, talking like this means "the terrorists win" and it makes me un-American, but that's not really where I'm going right now.

I'm having trouble with the whole General Motors mess. And pretty soon, it's going to be the #2 automaker in the world.

Many analysts believe Toyota will pass G.M. this year as the world’s biggest auto company, given an aggressive expansion plan that comes as G.M. is losing market share in the United States. Toyota is scouting sights for another assembly plant and a new engine plant, and will open a truck factory in San Antonio this fall.

On Friday, Toyota said it was on track to meet its forecast of selling 8.45 million vehicles in its current fiscal year, which ends March 31.

G.M. has not released a sales forecast, but it sold just over 9.1 million vehicles last year.

I was alive back when Charles Wilson, GM CEO almost* said, "What's good for GM is good for the country".
I believed it, too.

What does it mean (if anything) that another American icon is displaced from the top of the heap?
Nothing?
The Apocalypse?
Time to invest internationally?

Or does it mean that guys like me who really like Pontiac Vibes (engineered by Toyota) are simply making reasonable choices?

First off, like many Boomers right now, I am probably overthinking pretty much everything in my life. But the initial tendency for many of us is to declare the grapes slightly tart - "They're all multi-nationals, what difference does it make?"

Another answer I'm hearing is to play our military trump card - "Oh yeah, we could still invade those guys tomorrow and whup 'em!". It is one area where we have unchallenged leadership. Only that isn't looking quite as impressive as it used to, since the baddies are fighting a different kind of war.

Or we could just go into denial, which seems to be a popular option. "We're still the best". This is where the PR flacks earn their salaries. By coming up with obscure measurements and bizarre comparisons we can squint one eye and with the right perspective still seem to be #1.

American agriculture may be about to turn a similar corner if our ag balance of trade goes deficit. I can't wait to see how the end-zone-dancers tweak the old "feeding-the-world" brag. My guess is we'll use a narrower statistic to prove our claim. (In fairness, remember that ag trade stats include wine, for example).

You can kinda hear that already from our friends at USDA:

Aside from its symbolic value, the U.S. agricultural trade balance is not by itself a measure of export competitiveness, or import dependence. The U.S. remains a highly competitive exporter of grains, oilseeds, red meats, poultry, and cotton. But the U.S. also imports large quantities of grain products, vegetable oils, beef, pork, and cattle. U.S. farmers and food manufacturers do not and cannot produce all or enough of the foods that Americans desire, especially tropical crops. Today, trade is simply a means of providing for needs and wants that are not satisfied domestically or are more cheaply produced elsewhere. [More]

For me the larger question is our insistence on keeping score. We really have trouble being anything but Numero Uno. This may mean decades of permanent disgruntlement as the rest of the world not merely catches up, but passes us in specific areas.

Seems like a waste to me. For example, my buddies in Denmark aren't number one at anything, except maybe being happy.

Maybe if I stopped watching the scoreboard, I could enjoy the game more.


*At one point GM had become the largest corporation registered to that point in the United States, in terms of its revenues as a percent of GDP. In 1953 Charles Erwin Wilson, then GM president, was named by Eisenhower as Secretary of Defense. When he was asked during the hearings before the Senate Armed Services Committee if as secretary of defense he could make a decision adverse to the interests of General Motors, Wilson answered affirmatively but added that he could not conceive of such a situation "because for years I thought what was good for the country was good for General Motors and vice versa". Later this statement was often misquoted, suggesting that Wilson had said simply, "What's good for General Motors is good for the country." At the time, GM was one of the largest employers in the world – only Soviet state industries employed more people. On December 31, 1955, General Motors became the first American corporation to make over one billion dollars in a year. [More]