Day142 Tuesday 01/18/11

ran 3.9 miles
You may not know this, but the American dollar has been the world’s reserve currency since World War II. Whatever nation possesses the power to hold the claim to the world’s reserve currency is obviously the biggest economic batter at the plate. In fact, these are some of the entitlements that come with owning the accolade of being the world reserve currency holder:

• No one else on the face of the Earth can print money (monopoly money) at such a slow rate of consequence. But if you print enough monopoly money, eventually it devalues that nation’s economy and, ultimately, its strength as a country. And it is extremely insulting to the rest of the world and their many adversities when America is viewed as a nation who passes “Go” and collects two hundred dollars (hundreds of millions of times) more frequently than every other nation.

• As the current world reserve currency holder, every commodity and resource is obviously priced with the value of the American dollar as a basis. Advantageously, the nation who holds the right to world reserve currency does not have to adjust their prices for goods on the values of other national dollars. For example, gas for your vehicle in America is the cheapest you will find compared to any other country. Gas prices all over the world in any direction from the American center range from just above our low $3 mark all the way up to $14 for a gallon of gas. And these are not third-world countries; these are powerful countries with leaner, more ordered economies.

• Bread, milk, medicine---it’s all relative; when your nation possesses the power of being the world’s reserve currency holder, everything is naturally cheaper and more prosperous than everywhere else in the world. What American statistics would mark as a low-class family in America is easily a middle-class family in many other prosperous countries, and in even more countries low-class America would be considered upper-class elsewhere.

So, with all that has been said, what nation, with leaders who obviously want the best for their country and naturally feel America has perhaps had their run for too long and has maybe been too irresponsible, would not salivate over the possibility of becoming the next world reserve currency holder, with all of the benefits it entails that Americans have been enjoying for so long? Who wouldn’t?

This has happened in other nations before, namely England. They were the primary currency for over one hundred and fifty years until they did exactly what America is doing now. All of these bailouts and all of the spending to come is a last ditch effort to salvage something that is nearly too far-gone. Barack Obama, I would like to think, has good intentions of making things continue to seem as American as he can for as long as he can, but, if that is the case then he is in total denial of the larger picture of America and his efforts are only facades of an opposite reality.

As a closing note, there is no law in America that prohibits any kind of retailer from accepting foreign currency for purchases in America. Our retailers don’t accept foreign currency only because we have the most valuable dollar. But, should power shift, which is quite possible, we could possibly pay retailers Chinese dollars (Yuan), or some other currency one day soon, because we suffocated our own economy and made the American dollar second or even fourth-grade.

1,713.0 miles to go.