the meat of the article:
Euro Trash
Even drug dealers are giving up on the dollar.
By Daniel Gross
The dollar's decline against the euro shows no sign of ending. Clearly, currency traders have made a long-term judgment about the relative value of the currencies of the Old and New Worlds. That sounds bad enough. But now there are signs that we're losing some of the most devoted fans of the greenback: drug dealers, Russian oligarchs, and black-market traffickers of all kinds.
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The United States benefits greatly from the fact that the dollar is the world's reserve currency. Many of the $100 bills circulating throughout the globe are essentially loans that we never have to pay back. Americans use them to buy goods, services, or other currencies. But many of those bills never return to our shores to be redeemed for anything we make or produce. Instead, they stay under mattresses in Bogotá, circulate in Iraq, and are stashed in bank accounts around the world.
i've always thought that the U.S. always looked to minimize the use of our currency in shady dealings, but the last paragraph reveals a different angle. i don't pay that much attention but in major stings when U.S. currency is conficated is it then destroyed therefore further validating this last statement?
Also i'm curious if things get worse for our economy if one of the things that get's changed is making a higher denomination much like the Euro's have. Which in my opinion would be a blatant attempt to win favor back to the black market currency exchange. Or would the economy actually be better off since the U.S. wouldn't have to track down all of it's lost currency. My main reason for asking is because i don't believe our government does anything unless there's a way for someone in power to profit...
Finally, in the past two years, euros have also become easier to carry, store, and hide than dollars. Generally, the largest denomination of U.S. currency readily available is the $100 bill. But in the past two years, the European Central Bank has started to print 200-euro and 500-euro bills. These larger bills thus allow for the concentration of wealth in smaller packages. At today's rates, a 500-euro note is worth $682.
So the dollar falls which on the surface is another testament to the piss poor state of our current government. But digging deeper i wonder if in one hand this is really a good thing for the American people since we wouldn't have to pay for marines to go bust down some drug kingpins door down, but not good for our government since they have certain interests in keeping the dollar a favorable currency for crooks.
Or am i completely off the mark.
Complete article link
Euro Trash
Even drug dealers are giving up on the dollar.
By Daniel Gross
The dollar's decline against the euro shows no sign of ending. Clearly, currency traders have made a long-term judgment about the relative value of the currencies of the Old and New Worlds. That sounds bad enough. But now there are signs that we're losing some of the most devoted fans of the greenback: drug dealers, Russian oligarchs, and black-market traffickers of all kinds.
~
The United States benefits greatly from the fact that the dollar is the world's reserve currency. Many of the $100 bills circulating throughout the globe are essentially loans that we never have to pay back. Americans use them to buy goods, services, or other currencies. But many of those bills never return to our shores to be redeemed for anything we make or produce. Instead, they stay under mattresses in Bogotá, circulate in Iraq, and are stashed in bank accounts around the world.
i've always thought that the U.S. always looked to minimize the use of our currency in shady dealings, but the last paragraph reveals a different angle. i don't pay that much attention but in major stings when U.S. currency is conficated is it then destroyed therefore further validating this last statement?
Also i'm curious if things get worse for our economy if one of the things that get's changed is making a higher denomination much like the Euro's have. Which in my opinion would be a blatant attempt to win favor back to the black market currency exchange. Or would the economy actually be better off since the U.S. wouldn't have to track down all of it's lost currency. My main reason for asking is because i don't believe our government does anything unless there's a way for someone in power to profit...
Finally, in the past two years, euros have also become easier to carry, store, and hide than dollars. Generally, the largest denomination of U.S. currency readily available is the $100 bill. But in the past two years, the European Central Bank has started to print 200-euro and 500-euro bills. These larger bills thus allow for the concentration of wealth in smaller packages. At today's rates, a 500-euro note is worth $682.
So the dollar falls which on the surface is another testament to the piss poor state of our current government. But digging deeper i wonder if in one hand this is really a good thing for the American people since we wouldn't have to pay for marines to go bust down some drug kingpins door down, but not good for our government since they have certain interests in keeping the dollar a favorable currency for crooks.
Or am i completely off the mark.
Complete article link
