Is the Almighty Dollar Doomed?
As the world reels from the worst recession since the 1930s — a recession triggered by faulty U.S. economic stewardship — a vociferous chorus of critics is calling for a coup to topple King Dollar. In late March, Zhou Xiaochuan, the governor of China’s central bank, said the global economy would be better off with a “supersovereign” reserve currency, in place of one issued by a specific nation — in other words, the dollar. “The frequency and increasing intensity of financial crises,” Zhou said, “suggests the costs of such a system to the world may have exceeded its benefits.” Zhou recommended turning Special Drawing Rights (SDRs), the unit of account used by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), into the premier international currency. Then a U.N. panel of economists led by Joseph Stiglitz, the Nobel laureate, concluded that a reformed financial system with a new No. 1 international currency would help bring greater strength and equity to the global economy. Stiglitz told reporters there was a “growing consensus that there are problems with the dollar reserve system,” which he described as “relatively volatile, deflationary [and] unstable.” (See 25 people to blame for the financial crisis.)
Arguments against the status quo have their merits. Over the past two years, global dependence on the dollar has been at the heart of the world’s nastiest economic problems. Early in 2008, a weakening dollar was a factor in spiking prices of energy, commodities and food, which placed a disproportionate burden on the limited incomes of the poor. The dollar-dominated system has also allowed the U.S. to finance its budget and trade deficits at a low cost, which perpetuated the global imbalances that contributed to the current economic crisis. A system like the one proposed by Beijing, argues Deutsche Bank economist Jun Ma, would make it possible “for China and many other countries to avoid being victims of the systemic risks generated by domestic economic problems and policy mistakes in issuing countries of major reserve currencies.”
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