Global Economy

What are the consequences of floating exchange rates?

When I received this book, I turned first to the contribution of Murray N. Rothbard, "The Gold Exchange Standard in the Interwar Years." 

Clinton has called for a new global financial architecture, but it is sure to collapse.

 Superpower leaders just aren't what they used to be, and it's a good thing too. 

Let us just say we abolish all federal labor law. What happens then?

Two Austrian economists argue that the markets are overinflated. 

 Half of U.S. currency is held overseas. What happens if (when?) it is repatriated?

British Prime Minister Tony Blair apologized for doing "too little" in response to the Irish Potato Famine of the 19th century that killed one million people and brought about the emigration of millions more. But in fact, the English government was guilty of doing too much.

The 50th anniversary of the Marshall Plan provided another occasion for the media to celebrate the government's good works. The U.S.'s headlong plunge into global welfarism (nearly $100 billion in current dollars), they said, saved European economies after the Second World War. One reporter, Garrick Utley of NBC, even theorized that Marshall aid explains why East Germany was poor and West Germany rich.

One peculiar aspect of the 1993–95 trade debate was the contradictory purposes—or so it seemed—of Nafta and Gatt. They embrace different theories of how the U.S. should conduct trade policy. The "bilateralistists" think that the U.S. should negotiate trade with one country at a time. The "multilateralists" say that leads to protectionist alliances; what we really need is one big agreement with the world.