The Continuing Dominance of the Dollar

Episode Details

In the 1950s and 1960s, the dollar was as “good as gold” – until it wasn’t. The dollar no longer served as the centerpiece of the world’s fixed exchange rate arrangement when the Bretton Woods system broke apart in the early 1970s. But the dollar has remained, to this day, the dominant currency for international trade and global finance.

What advantages does the United States enjoy because of the special role of the dollar? Are other currencies, like the Euro or the Renminbi, or even cryptocurrencies, likely to replace the dollar’s hegemonic position? Megan Greene discusses this topic which has important implications for the United States economy as well as the stability of the world monetary system.

Megan is a Senior Fellow at the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government at Harvard Kennedy School, and is also the first Dame DeAnne Julius Senior Fellow in International Economics at Chatham House, UK.