Who pays for this? Our kids? The weak dollar is directly traceable to our entitlement over-spending and borrowing from foreign countries to pay for it. How long before we fix it? One thing is for sure, the world markets will fix it for us if we don’t fix it ourselves!
What currencies is the dollar weak with respect to? What are entitlement expenditures like under the governments that control those currencies? HTH, HAND
the weak dollar is directly traceable to our entitlement over-spending and borrowing from foreign countries to pay for it
umm, and has nothing to do with the METRIC SHITLOAD* we’re spending on Iraq?
*metric, because it’s bigger.
Always amusing when people build arguments to meet their assumptions.
The dollar is weak with respect to most baskets of major foreign currencies. Over the past 2 years it’s dropped with respect to the yen, euro, peso, yuan, shekel, Swiss franc, Canadian dollar, Aussie and Kiwi dollars.
It’s gone up or stayed flat on average against the pound and the rupee, though.
If one were to create a currency basket based on size of economies in different countries, and track that over time, it would surely indicate a general decline over the last 2 years. I’d say that for most relevant purposes, one can generalize now that the US dollar has gone down without specifying a “with respect to”.
He asked a 2-part question 😉
Not arguing that point. I’m just saying that it isn’t our (comparatively anemic, and poorly managed) entitlement spending which is devaluing our currency because our currency is falling relative to countries with much higher entitlement spending.
Pah, facts just get in the way of good polemic.
We should bomb those countries.
Those other countries generally have high enough taxes so they are not going into debt to pay for their social programs.
It’s solely because of borrowing from foreign countries, not because of entitlement expenditures. Although currency exchange rates fluctuate arbitrarily and are often manipulated by governments, in general a currency will fall if its users are net borrowers and a currency will rise if its users are net lenders.
Side question: Is a falling currency necessarily bad?
Seems to me we should have better export power if this happens, although my generation might be less likely to buy their kids European toys, like Legos.
Falling currency does help exports. Depends on objectives.