The US was a debtor nation long before teh 1980s. The US became a debtor nation in 1917 when it used Fed money to finance WWI.
In modern times, we were a creditor nation up until 1984. We have continuously been a debtor nation since then with no end in sight.
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U.S. Is Bigger Debtor Nation
Reuters
Published: July 04, 1989
The United States, already the world's largest debtor, sank an additional $154.2 billion into the red last year as foreign money poured in to plug the nation's balance-of-payments gap.
The value of foreign investments in the United States, ranging from stocks to factories, exceeded American investments abroad by $532.5 billion at the end of 1988, up from $378.3 billion a year earlier, the Commerce Department said last week.
As recently as 1984, the United States was a net creditor to the rest of the world by about $3.3 billion.
In 1981, before the American budget and current-account deficits started to balloon, the net investment position was a positive $140.9 billion, the Commerce Department said.
http://www.nytimes.com/1989/07/04/business/us-is-bigger-debtor-nation.html
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*Note: Not a great source, but a well-cited article, nonetheless.*
From 1850 through the end of World War I (1914–1918), America's trade balance moved from slightly unfavorable to enormously favorable, reflecting the nation's emergence as a world economic power and the continuation of trade protectionism. Thus, from 1850 to 1873, the merchandise trade deficit totaled $400 million, as exports grew from $152 million to $524 million. From 1874 to 1895, the trade balance turned favorable on the strength of agricultural exports and increases in shipments of manufactured goods. Volume increased steadily as well, with exports of goods and services reaching $1 billion for the first time in 1891. From 1896 to 1914, the trade balance was markedly favorable, as U.S. manufacturers competed globally for markets. Indeed, the merchandise trade balance was some $9 billion in surplus for this period. Purchases of services reduced the overall trade surplus to $6.8 billion. Spurred by the European demand for U.S. goods and services during World War I, the U.S. trade surplus soared from 1915 to 1919. Net goods and services totaled $14.3 billion for the five-year period, with exports topping $10.7 billion in 1919—an amount that was not exceeded until World War II (1939–1945). Not incidentally, America also became a creditor on its current account for the first time, on the strength of lending to wartime allies Britain and France.
From World War II to the Twenty-First Century
During the interwar period, the U.S. trade balance was consistently in surplus on greatly reduced volumes of trade, even as the merchandise trade balance turned negative from 1934 to 1940. As was the case during World War I, U.S. exports soared during World War II, peaking at $21.4 billion in 1944. Much of this volume was owed to the lend-lease program. As a result, America enjoyed an enormously favorable balance of trade, which it sustained during the early postwar period, from 1945 to 1960.
The favorable trade position of the United States at the end of World War II, underpinned by the relative strength of its manufacturing sector, contributed to the willingness of U.S. administrations to liberalize the global trading regime through the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade and its successor, the World Trade Organization. Both Democratic and Republican administrations remained committed to a freer trade policy stance—de-spite many exceptions, most notably steel, autos, and semiconductor chips—even as the U.S. merchandise trade balance disappeared in the late 1960s and then turned negative in the context of growing competitiveness on the part of European and Japanese manufacturers and sharply increased prices for crude oil.
From 1984 to 2000, the merchandise trade balance topped $100 billion in all but the recession years of 1991 and 1992, even as trade volumes increased absolutely and relative to GNP. In 1997, it exceeded $200 billion, as exports nearly reached $900 billion and GNP hit $8 trillion for the first time. For the twelve months ending 31 December 2001, the merchandise trade deficit stood at $425 billion. A surplus in services, which grew from $6.1 billion in 1980 to $85.3 billion in 1997, has offset 30 to 40 percent of the deficit on goods. America has funded its trade deficit largely by attracting foreign investment, so that it runs large surpluses on its capital account. As a result, the United States became the world's largest debtor on its current account during the 1980s and remained so at the beginning of the twenty-first century.
http://www.answers.com/topic/balance-of-trade
