Not at all. Albeit, my higher degrees come from private schools.
A graph showing the dollar rising for 4 years while the trade deficit increases does not prove that the rising deficit weakens the dollar.
Yes, it does. Anyways, its over four years running now.
You and Tim Kane's "no relationship" is destroying the U.S. currency. I could insert an LOL in at this point, except, I don't think it's a laughing matter, despite your manifest hyena tendancies, Todd .
The larger lesson is that the dollar has no obvious relationship with the trade deficit. The exchange rate rose and fell from 1990 to 2005 on a trade-weighted basis, while the trade balance simply fell and fell further.
You can't read a chart. It appears you have flunked more than math. Logic.
By calling for the yuan to float, some voices are actually calling for the dollar to fall further,
Are these only voices in your head, Todd? Why don't you put a name to them, Todd? Ever heard of Snow? Zoellick? Greenspan? Bernanke.?Etc. The supporters for the Yuan float are not mere "voices" but are the overwhelming tide of U.S. financial experts. There are certainly disagreements between some analysists of Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, etc. One of the analysts of Morgan Stanley - in the shape of Andy Xie - believes that the differentials between prices of origin in China and end prices in Europe and the US are so huge that there is bags and bags of room for absorption along the line. So, in part, I would agree that yuan-adjustment to real levels doesn't by itself deal with the U.S.-Chinese import imbalance. China has to end the barriers. And it also has to pay the royalties they scofflaw over. And the U.S. has to seriously think of tariffs.
... but there is scant evidence this will bring balance to the trade accounts.
A universal dollar decline certainly is not in our interest as either individuals or as a country. However, a targetted correction of a specific foreign malefactor, guilitiest of the grossest manipulations certainly can't hurt. Equally clearly, it isn't even being honestly tried as against the pegged currency of China. They're just playing lip-service to it. And many of the Pacific Rim countries are tied to stay near-competitive vis a vis China, as the wage price-setting gorilla.
Tim Kane Ph.D. who, unlike Paul Ross, did not fail basic math (or reading comprehension).
You fail, along with Tim Kane, to have any comprehension of the decline from 120 to 85 that is shown in the chart, that is denoted as "real trade weighted exchange value of U.S. $ versus major currencies. (The baseline of 100 is set from 1973 dollars).
So in fact, the dollar fell with those major currencies in the end of the chart..just as a "relationship" would predict.
And much, much worse for you it has continued since then... as shown by just these 2006 charts:
The previous five year portion of the range which you and Kane so lamely squint at to try and belabor a dispute is easily explained. We can debate cause/effects, certainly there are more than one "cause" but the clear evidence, and logically inescapable conclusion is that trade has impacts on exchange value.
Such impacts may be regulated or countered via Government interferences...by a number of government actors. Can you say pegging, Todd? At some point, these pegs are relaxed, such as Japan, case by case, and the free market is allowed to actually happen.
Tell us again how the Federal Reserve sets interest rates on T-Bills again.
I see you can't read an economist. They set the rates they sell at. That is the prerogative of governments selling governmental issues, Todd. They have delayed, deferred, and reduced sales before based on preliminary indicates they wouldn't get sales at their price.