As more candidates throw their hats into the 2024 Presidential ring, I’d like to offer a proposal that should have immediate bipartisan support: stop minting pennies and nickels. The economic […]
Tag: Currency
De-dollarization Has Begun: Redux
Last week’s article (“De-dollarization Has Begun”) produced a large number of comments and follow-up questions. Enough, in fact, that it feels necessary to address the most common of them in […]
De-dollarization Has Begun.
Last week, China and Brazil reached an agreement to settle trades in one anothers’ currencies. Over the past 15 years, China has replaced the United States as the main trading […]
A CBDC Would Not Be Money in the Sense Used in the Constitution
The latest fad in monetary policy circles worldwide is CBDC or Central Bank Digital Currency, a government-created cryptocurrency exchanged on a blockchain. Many fear that it would give governments complete […]
The Tragedy of the Monetary Commons
Earlier this month, Argentina and Brazil announced that they would begin working to implement a common currency. The news shocked many economists, including Oliver Blanchard, former chief economist of the […]
The Political History of Money
Those who fail to study the intellectual debates of the past are condemned to repeat them,” is a variation on Santayana’s famous dictum particularly applicable to economics and monetary theory, […]
King Dollar’s Uncertain Throne
Behold, the dollar ascendant! Since June 2021, the greenback has been on a tear, recently reaching levels not seen since July 2002. In a year in which virtually every asset […]
Modeling the Money Supply
When economists model the supply of a good or service, they usually describe how its availability on the market responds to its price. This requires making several assumptions about market […]
How Common Has Private Currency Been?
Recently, an investment advisor and Bitcoin proponent tweeted the claim that “[f]or most of human history” the “[s]eparation of money and state was the norm, even if the state stamped their ruler’s […]
Paul Krugman and the “Ersatz” Theory of Private Currencies
Although I’ve devoted many essays here to exploding myths about historical private currencies, there’s one I’ve yet to directly challenge. That’s the belief that such currencies only thrive in the […]