Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Analysis and Excreable Solution
Review: The author does an excellent job of analyzing why the U. S. dollar will crash, explaining very well the factors that will lead to such a crisis. His proposed solutions, unfortunately, recommend the same factors that will cause the crisis in the first place. He is employed by the World Bank and I am sure that his book and its proposed solutions were approved by it prior to its publication.Winston Churchill is reported to have said of noted academic of his time that "he knows everything and understands nothing." Unfortunately, this book discloses the same tendencies on the part of its author.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent
Review: The content of the book was amazing.
The person who gave it one star complains about flawed economics. He easily forgot that economics is a flawed science by itself. Most of the famous theories that we as economists (including myself) learnt haven't worked. All I know for sure is that the modern era economics and the economists are totally out of reality. They are consistently wrong with their predictions and their theories and their implementation have failed dramatically. This book is an eye opener and as real as it gets. Some People will not like its content because they do not want to believe that modern economic policies have failed. (the pewrson who complained talks about a model showing that the U.S. could sustain its level of current account deficit level for another 20 years)
this statement is laughable.....
The deficits if they keep growing like that they will destroy the dollar.PERIOD. MODELS are for people who sit in ivory Towers totally out of reality.
The author of the book has proven right up to now and the dollar collapse has already started.
AGAIN AMAZING WORK....One of the best books I have read on the dollar and deficits and the real dangers that lie ahead of us.
It seems to me that some people can make the black white making the Debt problem of the US looking like nothing. The US phenomenon is the biggest CREDIT, DEBT, ASSET BUBBLE ever on this planet.
We technically exchange paper money for goods and the thing is that the other countries accept that. My advice is:
Buy this book and read it. It will open your eyes and pay off for its price multiple times. I got the idea about this book from Richard Russell's newsletter. He himself that has seen everything in his extremely succesfull career has been completely amazed by the book and keeps mentioning it. Do yourself a favor and don't listen to the economists that are consistently wrong. Listen to some people with experience in the field.
Rating:
Summary: Good treatment
Review: The review space says to keep it under 1,000 words. I'll do better than that. Many of the reviewers are very windy with their reviews. If you consider yourself a student of the science of economics this is a good book for debate. It has an interesting perspectives on world currency policy and an interesting solution for the obvious currency crisis that the world faces. Interestly enough, no one's listening to his solutions today, but 2003 delivered a relatively sharp change in US currency valuation. Like with most things from an economic prespective, interesting but have you considered.... (blah, blah, blah). Buy it. The book is definitely worth your time and money.
Rating:
Summary: U.S. Dollars - Too Much of a Good Thing
Review: There is an unsettling conviction to Richard Duncan's assessment of world trade today, and it is forcefully explained and supported with dozens of charts and tables. An enormous U.S. trade deficit has created a sea of liquidity and easy credit for those nations to whom we are indebted. Without a Global Central Bank to control the money supply, the debt and liquidity it provides keep growing. Nations on the Surplus side of this trading arrangement have few choices with their outsized inflow. If they keep it in their central bank reserves, their currencies will appreciate, their exports, and their economies will slow. If it is absorbed into their economies in the form of low interest rate loans to business and individuals it will spark inflation, excess capacity, and ultimately recession and deflation. Economic crises in Asia and Japan are evidence of this damaging cycle. Consequently, much of our indebtedness, our trade imbalance, returns from our trading partners like a boomerang, to buy dollar-denominated securities. Returning capital adds to asset inflation and creates more credit, more capacity, and fewer opportunities to make a profit. Add this: Our trade deficit is growing and at some point one or more market segments of the economy - direct investments, corporate securities, even government securities - will no longer accomodate this inflow of repatriated foreign capital. At the center of this mess is a structural flaw in our global economy. It began when the U.S. Dollar decisively replaced gold in the 1970's as the basis for value in world trade and became the de facto global reserve currency. In the absence of monetary controls our trading partners accept our promises (our bonds) in place of cash or gold in payment for trade. Up to what point is uncertain. According to Duncan our cumulative indebtedness to the rest of the world is approximately $3 trillion or 30% of our GDP and it increased by five hundred billion last year. A drop in the value of the U.S. greenback seems likely (for Duncan, "inevitable"). If it helps our exporters begin to bridge the import-export gap then let it happen. Longer term, Duncan calls for an escalating Global Minimum Wage in the export industries of our trading partners to stimulate the development of a consumer class to supplement the world engine of American consumption. Currently the International Monetary Fund (IMF) assumes the role of a supervisory central bank for national economies in crisis. Duncan would like to see its role evolve into a Global Central Bank. In an advisory role a GCB just might be politically acceptable and useful in moderating boom-bust cycles caused by trade imbalances. My only caveat with Duncan's thesis is that his case is made and repeated so strongly that it seems to disallow for the possibility of unforseen events leading us to a more benign state.
Rating:
Summary: Sobering Analysis
Review: This book is not for the already depressed. It paints a stark picture of the dangers ahead of us....and the financial muck we are up to our ears in!
This book should be read by every Reagonomics fan out there....so they can see how flawed their economic theory is...
Overall, this book presents a lot of analysis to back up it's arguments. There are lots of graphs/charts throughout the book...so it's not a quick read....it's more of an academic study in my opinion..
Rating: 
Summary: Great points on international trade issues, poor solutions
Review: This book is really worth the read for anyone trying to make sense of our world economic environment. Mr. Duncan makes many persuasive points as he explains the cause of the boom/bust cycles that have occurred since the breakdown of the Bretton Woods agreement. A major point is that the proliferation of a fiat "dollar standard" has created credit inflation in the banking systems of export heavy nations. This increase in credit created much distortion and malinvestment, and the cycle ended with over-capacity and speculation. Asset bubbles were then created in equities and real estate. He also describes the "boomerang dollar" as the money flowing out of the US, because of our current account deficit, finds it's way back here as foreign nations buy our corporate, federal, and agency debt. Our budget deficit is largely financed by foreigners who then add the dollar denominated assets to their bank reserves. The author's work is well researched and presented.
In part four the author presents his solutions to what he believes is a looming global deflationary depression. He describes a global minimum wage, and the empowerment of the IMF to basically become the world's central bank. It was enough to make the Austrian hairs stand up on the back of my neck. I believe his solutions are thankfully unworkable. The cost and logistics of overseeing the minimum wage compliance would be staggering. We have enough trouble enforcing work laws in our own country. How do we expect some UN knockoff to monitor an employer in Saigon or Calcutta? The author's solution to allow the IMF to use special drawing rights to provide global welfare makes me wonder if he may have written the fourth part of his book as an intellectual exercise, target practice if you will.
Mr. Duncan's book is important in its factual examination of some very troubling global economic developments. I'm glad I read it. But, his solutions are way off the mark. Any real solutions come with much pain, it can't be avoided. We need a sound money system, less government intervention, and more reliance on free market forces.
Rating: 
Summary: Starts with conclusion and then uses facts to back it up
Review: this book is typical of this "the sky is falling" genre. It presents many useful statistics about trade imbalance and growing debt for the U.S. However, rather than try to determine potential scenarios or outcomes, I feel like the author is always trying to make the data fit his conclusions. While these conclusions may play out, most people are just not that good at determining the future. For example, he talks extensively about the coming disinflation. Since his book, inflation has reappeared. Also, it seems like it's going to be with us for a while because of the Fed's agressive monetary policy, and strong demand from China for commodities. Also, he tries (like many others) to suggest a gold standard is better than the fiat standard we have. While I understand the sentiment, it's just hard to believe that in today's very, very complex financial world that we could ever go back to Gold. Besides, no one (outside of the gold circles) seems to care if money isn't backed by gold. Bottom line for the world: If I borrow $10, it's my problem. If I borrow $3 trillion, it's everyone's problem. In other words, the world is married to the dollar for now, and any other marriage (i.e., to a future currency) will take a lot of time to unwind. Also, countries are probably not going to stop buying our debt for quite a while since we're all hooked. Bottom line for the book: Great facts. Conclusions too far-reaching.
Rating:
Summary: Starts with conclusion and then uses facts to back it up
Review: this book is typical of this "the sky is falling" genre. It presents many useful statistics about trade imbalance and growing debt for the U.S. However, rather than try to determine potential scenarios or outcomes, I feel like the author is always trying to make the data fit his conclusions. While these conclusions may play out, most people are just not that good at determining the future. For example, he talks extensively about the coming disinflation. Since his book, inflation has reappeared. Also, it seems like it's going to be with us for a while because of the Fed's agressive monetary policy, and strong demand from China for commodities. Also, he tries (like many others) to suggest a gold standard is better than the fiat standard we have. While I understand the sentiment, it's just hard to believe that in today's very, very complex financial world that we could ever go back to Gold. Besides, no one (outside of the gold circles) seems to care if money isn't backed by gold. Bottom line for the world: If I borrow $10, it's my problem. If I borrow $3 trillion, it's everyone's problem. In other words, the world is married to the dollar for now, and any other marriage (i.e., to a future currency) will take a lot of time to unwind. Also, countries are probably not going to stop buying our debt for quite a while since we're all hooked. Bottom line for the book: Great facts. Conclusions too far-reaching.
Rating: 
Summary: Good information & case for international diversification
Review: This book presents a fact and chart filled analysis of the recent history of the U.S. economic big picture, and how this fits into the global scenario. From this, Mr. Duncan explains his conclusions on why and when the U.S. dollar will plumment. He must be commended for all the research and the way the many charts and explanations build a solid case that there IS a considerable long term risk to the dollar, unless the current overall trends (public and private) in the U.S. economy change. As a layman student of the markets and economics, I found this a very interesting read, and believe that the information presented is valuable to everyone who has a lot of dollar denominated investments. My main concern, is the author makes the all too common mistake in assuming: a. His scenario is absolutely certain.
b. His timing (e.g. in our face) of the coming event is certain.
c. His solutions would work, and are a must. Having read maybe 100 investment books in the last 25 years and having gained a fair amount of experience and perspective, I'll opine that this is vastly overstating his case. More realistically, he makes a strong case for why there are serious risks in a dollar-dominated portfolio, and therefore implicitly makes a strong case for a significant diversification to a global or asset (i.e. real estate, art, etc) segment of a prudent investor's portfolio. If Mr. Duncan had invested solid effort at the end of the book in providing cogent information about what the typical American investor could do to protect him/herself, instead of trying to convince his audience that he's absolutely right and the problem is imminent -- then this book would have earned 5 stars. As it is, the reader is forced to come up with the (balanced portfolio) advice on their own, which may well require more investment experience than the average reader can be expected to have.
Rating:
Summary: Retitle it "Total Global Government Will Fix Everything"
Review: This book was a big disappointment. It is very poorly written and the "solutions" the author proposes for fixing what's broken with the USD & international trade border on economic lunacy. You think I'm exagerating? You decide:
In the last chapter of this unfortunate book, the author proposes two "solutions" for the weak dollar and international trade imbalances. Here they are:
1. Global Minimum Wage
2. Global Money Supply Control
I'm not sure these two ideas would fix USD & international trade woes, but they would undoubtedly result in massive global unemployment & inflation, and they would serve as a very solid foundation on which to establish global tyranny on a scale that is hard to imagine today. The foolishness and potential destructiveness of these ideas raises grave questions, in my mind, about Mr. Duncan's competence in the economic sphere.
On every page you will find international trade and monetary policy jargon and vague chains of reasoning that are never adequately explained. This sort of writing may be fine for an experienced international trade professional, but it doesn't help lay readers seeking to learn more about the serious issues involved. I think many readers will find this book PRODUCES confusion rather than clarity.
One of the main theses in the book is that rising central bank assets cause inflation. While an argument can be supported that there is a "connection" between the two, one would be hard pressed to show that the connection is directly causal. Rather than clearly establishing a rational foundation for this claim, the author succeeds only in doing a lot of handwaving on the point. Inexplicably, the book focuses on reserve asset levels as the cause and ignores the inherently inflationary effect of fractional reserve banking systems & paper reserve assets. Hmmmm, I wonder why?
Concerning the same thesis, the book offers up many, many charts and graphs displaying all sorts of statistics tangential to the point, but somehow, the author never quite gets around to displaying any stats that explicitly show the US rate of inflation increasing in step with the Fed's total reserve asset level. Hmmm? What a puzzler, Mr. Duncan. Seems like you'd want to back up the major contention of your book (which you repeat mantra-like ad nauseum) with just such statistics, yet none is presented. Curious indeed.
Also, several graphs of central bank reserve assets are displayed, "...without gold", with no explanation as to why gold central bank assets are not included. Again, I wonder why?
Every chapter is awash with unstated assumptions and vague chains of reasoning. Also, a large proportion of the statisics and studies on which the author bases his assertions & conclusions are from the IMF, for which Mr Duncan worked for years. In summary, the book appears to be nothing more that a global central banker proposing global central government "solutions"
Sounds like the author subscribes to the well known dictum: EVERY problem looks like a nail if the only tool you have is a BIG HAMMER.
To be sure, there are useful descriptions of certain aspects of the machinery of international trade and banking, but you'll have to dig through so much confused thinking and just plain muddy water, it's not worth fishing out the occassionally satisfying tidbit.
Save your money!! This book only serves to confuse the issues involved. Consider yourself warned.
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