Playing Games with Money
To keep jobs and people employed, countries are playing games
with their money. By keeping their money weak, through
exchange rates or just printing a lot of it, a country’s exports are
cheaper. If a country’s currency strengthens and becomes more
expensive, their exports become expensive, exports fall, and jobs
are lost.
In 1966 when I first traveled to Japan as a student on board
a U.S. cargo ship, the U.S. dollar could buy 360 yen. As a
student, I could buy a lot with my dollar. Japan was cheap for
an American.
Today, the U.S. dollar buys approximately 90 yen. This means
the yen got stronger and the dollar weaker. Today, Japan is
expensive for Americans.
If Japan wants to save their economy, they need to weaken the
yen, maybe moving it back up to 150 yen to a dollar. American
exports will then become expensive, we will export less, and
thus lose jobs.
Keeping people employed is one reason that countries play
games with their money.
The War of Money
Today, the United States and China are in a ‘war of money.’
The United States wants China to raise the value of their
money so we can export more to them and import less.
China knows that if the value of their money increases so
does China’s unemployment.
In retaliation, the United States keeps devaluing the dollar
and China devalues their currency, the yuan. Weaker currency
means inflation at home.
This is one reason that the next oxymoron, save money, is
ridiculous. Why save money when countries are weakening
their money, making money less valuable and shopping at
Walmart more expensive?
We have to weaken the dollar if we want to save jobs. Because
with a weak dollar, we can export more. This means there will
be more demand for manufactured American goods, which
means there will be more jobs.
The foregoing are a few reasons why job security is an oxymoron.
Chapter Four
Unfair Advantage
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