Worldwide inflation and international monetary reform: Exchange rates or interest rates?

Abstract

The international dollar standard is malfunctioning. Near-zero US short-term interest rates launch massive hot money outflows into emerging markets (EM) in Asia and Latin America. Each EM central bank buys dollars to prevent its currency from appreciating but loses monetary control. Despite some appreciation, average inflation in EMs is now much higher than in the old industrial economies and world commodity prices are bid up sharply. This inflation on the dollar's periphery only registers in the US CPI with a long lag. However, the more immediate effect of the Fed's zero interest rate is to upset the process of bank intermediation within the American economy. Bank credit continues to decline while employment languishes. Therefore, constructive international monetary reform calls for the Fed to abandon its zero-interest rate policy, which is best done in cooperation with the European Central Bank, the Bank of Japan, and the Bank of England also abandoning their ultra low interest rates. © 2011 The Author China & World Economy © 2011 Institute of World Economics and Politics, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.