Intent to Expand US Debt Is Global Plunder

Published in Huanqiu
(China) on 8 January 2013
by Yaling Tan (link to originallink to original)
Translated from by Stefanie Zhou. Edited by Natalie Clager.
At the beginning of this year, the U.S. Congress unsurprisingly passed a motion on the “fiscal cliff.” So far, the fiscal cliff farce has come to a temporary end. However, various interpretations of the fiscal cliff by the outside world currently seem biased. This especially applies to the discussion around its nature, which seems to have deviated from the demands of U.S. national strategy.

The U.S. "fiscal cliff" is a false proposition. The U.S. budget deficit is not a matter of extreme urgency. The financial problems of the U.S. have existed for more than 40 years, during which only the year 2000 had a short-term fiscal surplus. After the international financial crisis in 2008, the U.S. economy went into recession, further expanding its budget deficit.

In 2011 international opinion paid close attention to U.S. bipartisan debate over the budget deficit. The eventual need for the two parties to return to national strategy unsurprisingly led to the debt being raised for the 79th time in the history of the United States.

2012 was the U.S. election year. The U.S. budget deficit was exaggerated as a “fiscal cliff,” and the level of debate over it was also upgraded immediately afterward. However, the U.S. has not really reached the edge of the “cliff” so far because its fiscal and monetary policies are supporting its economic and financial strength effectively.

The U.S. fiscal cliff doesn’t reflect the country’s debt only, but a manifestation of the U.S. global strategic layout. The discussion around the fiscal problems of the U.S. is closely linked to the global expansion of the dollar; the two expansions develop simultaneously.

The international financial markets at the end of last century were limited to financial products, financial institutions and financial systems, with a clear split between the markets. Federal Reserve policy and the implementation of U.S. dollar strategy expanded the scope of international financial markets. Through the dollar’s unique pricing mechanism and the quotation system, more and more areas and markets converged. After oil was included in the international financial markets, commodities, resource products and agricultural products were also included. This expanded the coverage of the dollar and enhanced its hegemony.

The dollar hegemony policy is the basis of the globalization and expansion of the U.S. budget deficit. The Fed's monetary policy appears to be conventional monetary policy of a country's central bank, but due to the unique nature of the dollar’s status, as well as the special nature of the U.S. economy, the objectives of its monetary policy have a global focus, not simply local or domestic.

On the one hand, global strategy decides the distribution and proportion of U.S. money supply: Sixty percent exists in the global context; only 40 percent exists to meet the domestic demand.

On the other hand, the dollar supply increase with changes in the global market configuration is not only a problem to the U.S. economy or a problem of bad public opinion. Essentially there is a shortage in the dollar supply and an increase in the money supply in order to achieve the coverage rate needed for dollar hegemony. It is thus clear that the Fed's monetary policy is not confined to the U.S. The expansion of the U.S. budget deficit reflects the inevitable result, and even gain, of the U.S. globalization strategy.

Thorough consideration is needed when discussing the fiscal cliff. Regarding the special nature and privileges of the dollar, especially in the face of intensifying global currency competition, the U.S. is paying more attention to monetary competitors and strategies, minimizing challenges that the dollar brings to opponents and restructuring the currency system. The future market needs to be vigilant for greater risks, namely the pressures and challenges brought to the world by the dollar hegemony strategy.

The author is the president of the Chinese Foreign Exchange Investment Research Institute


  新年伊始,美国国会不出意料地通过了关于“财政悬崖”的议案。至此,美国“财政悬崖”闹剧暂告一段落。但是,当下外界对“财政悬崖”的各种解读总让人感觉略显偏颇,尤其对其本质的讨论,似乎偏离了美国国家战略与利益的诉求与方略。

  美国“财政悬崖”是一个伪命题。美国财政赤字并非一个燃眉之急的焦点,美国的财政问题已经存在40余年,其中仅在2000年有过短暂的财政盈余。2008年国际金融危机发生后,美国经济出现了衰退,其财政赤字进一步扩大。

  2011年国际舆论曾关注美国两党对财政赤字的争论,最终两党回归美国国家战略的需要,也是没有悬念地实施了美国历史上的第七十九次债务上限提高。2012年是美国选举年,美国财政赤字被夸大为“财政悬崖”,对财政赤字争论也随即升级。但至今美国并未真正达到“悬崖”边际,因美国的财政政策和货币政策有效地支撑着经济与金融实力。

  美国“财政悬崖”并非国家单一概念的债务,而是美国全球战略布局的体现。美国财政问题的讨论与美元全球扩张紧密相连,其债务扩张与金融扩张并举。

  上世纪末的国际金融市场本来仅局限在金融产品、金融机构和金融体制,市场之间的分割十分清晰。美联储政策和美元战略的实施扩大了国际金融市场的概念与范围。通过美元独特的定价机制以及报价制度,越来越多的领域与市场衔接,继石油被纳入国际金融市场后,大宗商品、资源产品、农产品等均被纳入,扩展了美元覆盖范围,进一步增强了美元霸权。

  美元霸权政策是美国财政赤字全球化扩张的基础。美联储的货币政策看似一国央行常规的货币政策,但是由于美元地位的独特性以及美国经济的特殊性,其货币政策目标侧重全球化,并非本土化概念那么简单。

  一方面美国的全球化战略决定了美国货币供应量的分布与比重,60%的货币供应量在全球范畴,只有40%才是美元国内供应量的需求。

  另一方面美元货币供应量伴随全球市场配置的变化而增加,并不仅仅是美国经济本土的问题,也非舆论所简单评说的因为美国经济不好。实质是鉴于美元货币供应量不足,为实现美元霸权的覆盖率达到垄断而增加货币发行。可见,美联储的货币政策并不仅仅局限美国本土,美国财政赤字的扩张体现了美国全球化战略必然的结果甚至收益。

  在讨论美国“财政悬崖”时需要综合考量。针对美元的特殊性和特权性,尤其是面对全球货币竞争的加剧,美国更加关注货币竞争对手和战略,极力规避美元对手带来的挑战,重新架构货币新体系。未来市场需要警惕更大的风险,即美元霸权战略给世界带来的压力与挑战。

  (作者为中国外汇投资研究院院长)
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