Several U.S. political leaders have recently reiterated their desire to punish countries that undervalue their currencies. News flash: Since June 7, 2010, the value of the U.S. dollar has fallen 17.3 percent. If the United States gives countries a green light to designate low currency rates as an unfair trade …
Last Friday, The Heritage Foundation hosted three experts on international monetary policy for a lecture titled, “The Dollar, The Euro, and the International Monetary Order: What is the U.S. to Do?“. The panel consisted of Dr. Judy Shelton of the Atlas Economic Research Foundation, Dr. Robert Mundell, winner of a …
The New York Times, Washington Post, and others today ran front-page stories on economic and political disagreements the U.S. has with China. The headlines mostly distract from the real issue. China is nowhere close to a global military power but it is becoming a global economic power. It is therefore …
President Obama didn’t accomplish much on his Asia trip. He has the media covering for him, though. They’re not praising him, they’re making bigger errors than he did, especially on the U.S. and China. Tough times have made people pessimistic about America’s future, and with good reason. Elements of the …
Confusing times lead to conflicting concerns. Worries over current deflation run into worries about explosive inflation down the road and now there are growing worries over another global asset price bubble. All of these worries are valid, but the possible return of the asset price bubble is the newest and …
The dollar’s steady and sometimes fleet downward slide in exchange markets is eliciting a number of interesting explanations, but most commentators are only looking at their favorite piece of the economic puzzle. The dollar is under pressure against, well, every currency that matters. But why, and are there other financial …
The rumblings of the dollar’s decline are louder than usual at the moment, tied to speculation that oil producing countries are seeking to move to a basket of currencies in oil pricing, rather than using the dollar alone. There are genuine developments behind such rumblings, mostly concerning American economic policy. …
Remember when China was going to stop buying American bonds and the world was going to end? This hand-wringing was always wrong-headed; perhaps now it will finally cease. In May, net official Chinese holdings of U.S. Treasuries jumped $38 billion. This is the flip side of the return of large-scale capital …
Today’s New York Times op-ed page features two columns on the dollar and the Chinese currency, the RMB. Nouriel Roubini concentrates on American policy. Victor Gao gives a somewhat depressing lesson in personal Chinese economic history. It’s a better discussion than standard claims the PRC is trying to ruin the …
