Exorbitant privilege

Abstract: For more than half a century, the dollar has been not just America's currency but the world's. It is used globally by importers, exporters, investors, governments and central banks alike. This singular role of the dollar is a source of strength for the United States. It is, as a critic of U.S. policies once put it, America's "exorbitant privilege." But now, with U.S. budget deficits extending as far as the eye can see, holding dollars is viewed as a losing proposition. Some say that the dollar may soon cease to be the world's standard currency DS which would depress U.S. living standards and weaken the country's international influence. In Exorbitant Privilege, one of our foremost economists, Barry Eichengreen, traces the rise of the dollar to international prominence. He shows how the greenback dominated internationally in the second half of the 20th century for the same reasons that the United States dominated the global economy. But now, with the rise of China, India, Brazil and other emerging economies, America no longer towers over the global economy. It follows, Eichengreen argues, that the dollar will not be as dominant. But this does not mean that coming changes need be sudden and dire DL or that the dollar is doomed to lose its international status. Challenging the presumption that there is room for only one true global currency, Eichengreen shows that several currencies have regularly shared this role. What was true in the distant past will be true, once again, in the not-too-distant future. The dollar will lose its international currency status, Eichengreen warns, only if the United States repeats the mistakes that led to the financial crisis and only if it fails to put its fiscal and financial house in order. Incisive, challenging and iconoclastic, Exorbitant Privilege, is a fascinating analysis of the changes that lie ahead. It is a challenge, equally, to those who warn that the dollar is doomed and to those who regard its continuing dominance as inevitable.

Abstract: Does the center country of the International Monetary System enjoy an "exorbitant privilege" that significantly weakens its external constraint as has been asserted in some European quarters? Using a newly constructed dataset, we perform a detailed analysis of the historical evolution of US external assets and liabilities at market value since 1952. We find strong evidence of a sizeable excess return of gross assets over gross liabilities. Interestingly, this excess return increased after the collapse of the BrettonWoods fixed exchange rate system. It is mainly due to a "return discount": within each class of assets, the total return (yields and capital gains) that the US has to pay to foreigners is smaller than the total return the US gets on its foreign assets. We also find evidence of a "composition effect": the US tends to borrow short and lend long. As financial globalization accelerated its pace, the US transformed itself from a World Banker into a World Venture Capitalist, investing greater amounts in high yield assets such as equity and FDI. We use these findings to cast some light on the sustainability of the current global imbalances.

Abstract: We update and improve the Gourinchas and Rey (2007a) dataset of the historical evolution of US external assets and liabilities at market value since 1952 to include the recent crisis period. We find strong evidence of a sizeable excess return of gross assets over gross liabilities. The center country of the International Monetary System enjoys an gexorbitant privilege h that significantly weakens its external constraint. In exchange for this gexorbitant privilege h we document that the US provides insurance to the rest of the world, especially in times of global stress. This gexorbitant duty h is the other side of the coin. During the 2007-2009 global financial crisis, payments from the US to the rest of the world amounted to 19 percent of US GDP. We present a stylized model that accounts for these facts.

Abstract: An influential school of thought views the current international monetary and financial system as Bretton Woods reborn. Today, like 40 years ago, the international system is composed of a core, which has the exorbitant privilege of issuing the currency used as international reserves, and a periphery, which is committed to export-led growth based on the maintenance of an undervalued exchange rate. In the 1960s, the core was the United States and the periphery was Europe and Japan. Now, with the spread of globalization, there is a new periphery, Asia, but the same old core, the United States, with the same tendency to live beyond its means. This view suggests that the current pattern of international settlements can be maintained indefinitely. The United States can continue running current account deficits because the emerging markets of Asia and Latin America are happy to accumulate dollars. There is no reason why the dollar must fall, since there is no need for balance of payments adjustment; in particular, the Asian countries will resist the appreciation of their currencies against the greenback. I argue that this image of a new Bretton Woods System confuses the incentives that confronted individual countries under Bretton Woods with the incentives that confronted groups of countries. It imagines the existence of a cohesive bloc of countries called the periphery ready and able to act in their collective interest. I argue, to the contrary, that the countries of Asia constituting the new periphery are unlikely to be able to subordinate their individual interest to the collective interest. This image of the current system as Bretton Woods reborn also overlooks how the world has changed since the 1960s. This alternative reading of history and current circumstances suggests that even if there exists today something vaguely resembling the Bretton Woods System, it is not long for this world.