The Dollar's Inevitable Decline: An Excellent Tour Of Post Bretton Wood's Bubbles

I found this book well researched. It is analytical but accessible and a fair warning against the consequences of the endless debt pile.

Not for the faint of mind or heart

This book is unique among those which I have read concerning the seemingly inevitable collapse of the U.S. dollar. Most of the other books were "people oriented," telling the story of the dollar's demise in sufficient depth to adequately inform and alarm their readers, then suggesting what those readers might do to protect themselves from the coming calamity. This author takes a much broader --- global --- view; concentrating, not on the individual and his petty problems of survival, but on the developed nations of the world and their seemingly insurmountable problems. And he does his work in scrupulous detail, exploring every aspect of the problems which he investigates and providing a vast array of supporting evidence (mostly graphs, charts, and tables). It's not always easy to follow the thread of his story as it unfolds, but it's well worth the effort. For, among other things, it sheds a great deal of light on the real-world problems we in the U.S. face as a nation and the real world we are likely to experience if something isn't done, and done soon, to preclude the global impacts of the dollars fall from grace and its demise as the international reserve currency. So, if you would like to be alarmed on a global scale, rather than merely on a puny little personal scale, this book is a must read.

Among other things, it will help you to better understand: (1) why the Federal Reserve is so terrified of deflation that it will go to almost any lengths to prevent it; (2) why the economies of the world's major exporting nations are so dependent on the United States' balance of trade deficits and how it all came about; (3) why the continued trade deficits of the United States with its trading partners has been both a blessing and a curse for those nations; (4) how the dollars exported by the U.S. to buy foreign products are recycled to the U.S. so as to prop up America's financial system and why; (5) why the value of the euro rose, relative to the dollar, during the recent economic crisis while the values of the Japanese yen and the Chinese yuan fell; (6) why, in recent times the U.S. government has begun to fear that it has fostered too little inflation; (7) what happens when the U.S. balance of trade deficit is significantly larger than the U.S. budget deficit; (8) what would happen if, by chance, the U.S. government did manage to balance its budget; (9) why, no matter how much the U.S. dollar is devalued, deflation will continue, persist, and likely worsen; and (10) in today's world, what, if anything, can actually be done to prevent the worldwide depression likely to occur if, and when, the U.S. ceases to subsidize our trading partners through massive and unsustainable trade deficits and what the impact of that eventuality will be on the U.S. financial system (The author makes some serious and seemingly credible recommendations).

Not to be too selfish, but these things are well worth knowing if for no other reason than that they shed some light on what one might really expect to happen in the future and, perhaps, what he, or she, (a little political correctness there) might be able to do to protect him or her self.

In summary: This book, as noted earlier, is directed toward determining what the nations of the world, rather than the individual, might be able to do to protect themselves from an impending economic calamity caused by the collapse of the U.S. dollar. When studied from this perspective, the subject becomes much more complex and is, at least for the layman, a bit daunting. This book is so thorough, so comprehensive, and so relentlessly well documented, in fact, that, at times you might feel that you're back in school studying a new and difficult textbook. Nevertheless, the end does justify the means. For even if you only grasp half of what you read, it will certainly be well worth the effort even though the story this author tells may not be what you'd hoped to hear.

deflationary pressure then dollar collapse

The author clearly understands this really well. But at first it was confusing how he could say there was going to be deflation and the dollar was going to collapse, which is a hyperinflation sort of thing. Then it was clear, first deflation then Fed responds with lots of money, then dollar collapse.

Best book I've read...3 years too late

Mandatory reading for investors trying to understand how governments manipulate monetary policy and the effect upon asset prices.

The Reasons Behind the Economic Crisis

The Dollar Crisis introduces the reader to Austrian Economics and according to this theory trade imbalances create excess amounts of capital, which result in a credit boom. Businesses borrow this money and over invest causing a lost of profitability due to the increased amount of competition. The excess capital is then redeployed to other parts of the economy causing an speculative bubble, which eventually pops. This theory explains the Great Depression (after WW I the US had an excess amount of gold), the Latin America Banking crisis (OPEC countries had an excess amount of capitol after the spike in oil prices), and the Japanese bubble (the US/Japan trade deficit). Although the book was originally written in 2003 Richard Duncan could see that US current account deficit was creating speculative bubbles in the US stock, bond, and housing markets. This a good book for anyone interested in economic theories other than Keynesian and monetarism.