[QUOTE=asterion]
Maybe we can get our manufacturing base back up and running with the weak dollar and get back to a net export balance of trade?
Nah, that’d make too much sense.
[/QUOTE]
Until the dollar went up again and we move the factories to where ever else in the world the people will work for pennies, or a US dollar, a day.
[QUOTE=Spectre of Pithecanthropus]
Here we go again. The US dollar is now worth only 99 Swiss cents. Another interest rate cut is in the offing, which will doubtless hasten the dollar’s crash. To think that a Swiss Franc was once something of which you could get several for a dollar, and now you can’t even get one.
How much longer can the Fed undermine the currency in the name of political expediency before the whole thing blows up in our faces? What good is availability of credit if the dollar is worth, say, one Mexican peso?
Where will it end?
[/QUOTE]
Do a news archive search – over the past 30 or 40 years – with words like “dollar” “weak” “crash” and “plummet.”
The sky isn’t falling quite yet.
[QUOTE=MLS]
As a person working in the international shipping business, the trade goods certainly seem to be pouring and flying out the door.
[/QUOTE]
I was reading an article in the Economist the other day about the boom in US exports. The trade defecit is shrinking rapidly, despite the rising cost of oil imports. Manufacturers like Caterpillar are seeing exports up by as much as 30%, and tourism is going great guns.
This could be the start of The Great Rebalancing of The US Economy. Or it could be the cue for your Congresscritters to vote for mandatory anal probing of all incoming foreigners, and to pass a new Smoot-Hawley act which will cause every foreign nation to ban US goods from their shores. Place your bets…
How long the US dollar been worth less than the Canadian dollar?
Also interesting: the US is now the world’s second largest economy, behind the European Union.
Weak Dollar Costs U.S. Economy Its World No. 1 Spot (nytimes.com) By REUTERS, Published: March 14, 2008
[QUOTE=Arnold Winkelried]
Also interesting: the US is now the world’s second largest economy, behind the European Union.
Weak Dollar Costs U.S. Economy Its World No. 1 Spot (nytimes.com) By REUTERS, Published: March 14, 2008
[/QUOTE]
WOW!
I thought the US economy was already #2 behind China, though…
[QUOTE=Arnold Winkelried]
Also interesting: the US is now the world’s second largest economy, behind the European Union.
[/QUOTE]
Not even the whole EU - just the 15 countries that make up the eurozone.
[QUOTE=GomiBoy]
I saw the best interview the other day on the news. English journalist asking folks on the street in NYC about shopping. Anybody from the UK he talks to is like ‘woo-hoo!’ and getting stonkin’ good deals. He talks to these two older women from Iowa or something, and one says ‘I wouldn’t spend my money in Europe no matter what. I made my money in America, I will spend my money in America’ whilst wearing a red-white-and-blue t-shirt and with a slight lunatic uber-patriot glaze to her eye. .
[/QUOTE]
The level of mania you describe notwithstanding, I do sometimes feel a bit guilty for buying something imported, thinking that I’m helping to push the dollar down by doing so. But oh, that white Burgundy! Oh, that Entre-Deux-Mers that I’ve just discovered. We have good wines in California to be sure, but it seems that I can still get a better deal in French wine at the $10 to $12 range.
Since I posted the OP I’ve heard that the interest rate will be cut at least a whole point, and likely a point and a quarter.
This is all very disturbing, it’s like trying to save someone who’s falling by somehow falling faster and catching them. Only the ground is coming up very fast.
[QUOTE=Two and a Half Inches of Fun]
How long the US dollar been worth less than the Canadian dollar?
[/QUOTE]
The $C passed the $US on Sep. 20, 2007, or thereabouts. After going on a tear up to $1.10, it’s since slid back to more or less par for the last 5 months. It seems to be in a consistent range of $0.97 to $1.02.
Eh, all just pre-election jibber. Once the election is over, the market will turn the corner. Not saying it’ll be the good corner or the bad corner, but it WILL turn the corner.
For now, I’ll just vacation in the states or the Caribbean (the guilder is still below the buckeroo) and horde all the gold, platinum and palladium I can get my hands on. I’m not worried AT ALL.
Well, the Taiwan dollar is up about 5.5% YTD, and I’ve effectively gotten a US$XXX per year raise in USD terms while making the same amount of local money as before. May come in hand for paying off student loans, at least.
[QUOTE=Raygun99]
The $C passed the $US on Sep. 20, 2007, or thereabouts. After going on a tear up to $1.10, it’s since slid back to more or less par for the last 5 months. It seems to be in a consistent range of $0.97 to $1.02.
[/QUOTE]
So why does the book I just bought cost $6.99 in US dollars and $9.99 in Canadian dollars? Are Canadians getting screwed?
In 2002 I went to Europe and got about 1USD:1.05E. In 2004 I went and got 1/.75E. Yahoo shows it at about 1/.64 today. I don’t even want to see how bad we’re doing against the pound sterling.
Calm down people! The news today brought me needed reassurance.
In speaking to the press today, President George W. Bush said that we are “on top of the situation” and we have “taken strong and decisive action”, also adding that “our economy is going to be fine”.
[QUOTE=Arnold Winkelried]
Calm down people! The news today brought me needed reassurance.
In speaking to the press today, President George W. Bush said that we are “on top of the situation” and we have “taken strong and decisive action”, also adding that “our economy is going to be fine”.
[/QUOTE]
OH THANK GOD!!! :dubious:
[QUOTE=Two and a Half Inches of Fun]
So why does the book I just bought cost $6.99 in US dollars and $9.99 in Canadian dollars? Are Canadians getting screwed?
[/QUOTE]
Only if you actually buy from a Canadian seller. 
[QUOTE=Arnold Winkelried]
Calm down people! The news today brought me needed reassurance.
In speaking to the press today, President George W. Bush said that we are “on top of the situation” and we have “taken strong and decisive action”, also adding that “our economy is going to be fine”.
[/QUOTE]
At this point I wonder if Bush is trying desperately to put some positive spin on the situation, or is so far out in his own little world, that pixies with a GPS couldn't lead him back.
[QUOTE=Spectre of Pithecanthropus]
Good luck with that. You just about need a celebrity’s resources and income if you want to go there and be comfortable while you’re there (i.e., not hosteling or camping).
[/QUOTE]
Actually, you just need the right job. At the end of April, I’m off to London, Paris and Milan for a week and a bit. Exchange rate wise, I’m doing well.
London is the Sofitel St James, 80 pounds per night, Paris, the Novotel Gare de Lyon at 60E per night, and the best deal is in Milan at the Le Meridien at 59USD per night.
Y’all need to become travel agents - the great hotel rates make up for the shitty pay.
[QUOTE=Arnold Winkelried]
In speaking to the press today, President George W. Bush said that we are “on top of the situation” and we have “taken strong and decisive action”, also adding that “our economy is going to be fine”.
[/QUOTE]
We need a smiley that conveys shitting on someone’s head.