BALANCE OF TRADE: The difference between funds received by a country when exporting merchandise and the funds paid for importing merchandise. The balance of trade is a major part of the current accounts portion of the balance of payments. A balance of trade surplus results if exports exceed imports, commonly termed a favorable balance of trade, and a balance of trade deficit exists if imports exceed exports, analogously termed an unfavorable balance of trade. The "favorable" and "unfavorable" normative connotations attached to the balance of trade rests with the presumption that a nation is "better off" when it exports more than it imports, which is not necessarily true.

     See also | foreign trade | export | import | current account | balance of payments | balance of trade surplus | balance of trade deficit | favorable balance of trade | unfavorable balance of trade | normative economics |

BALANCE OF TRADE, AmosWEB GLOSS*arama, http://www.AmosWEB.com, AmosWEB LLC, 2000-2025. [Accessed: November 12, 2025].

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The state of equilibrium that exists in the long-run aggregate market when real aggregate expenditures are equal to full-employment real production with no imbalances to induce changes in the price level or real production. The opposing forces of aggregate demand (the buyers) and long-run aggregate supply (the sellers) exactly offset each other. At the existing price level, the four macroeconomic sectors (household, business, government, and foreign) purchase all of the real production that they seek and producers sell all of the real production that they have.

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