The Mineral Commodities Summary 2009 released by the USGS, reveals some incredible numbers on the economic impacts of nonfuel mineral production in this country.
In 2008 the domestic mineral raw materials from mining were worth $71.2 billion. In addition we recycled $23 billion of metals and mineral products (aluminum, steel, glass, etc). We also had net exports of old scrap of $15.1 billion. Processing those mineral materials domestically produced $609 billion. Add to that $46 billion of net imports of processed mineral materials that then all went to create $2,278 billion worth of value-added gross domestic product by major industries that consume processed mineral materials, equal to about 16% of the nation's total GDP.
The total economic impact nationally reaches $14,300 billion. [photo credit, Asarco]