Global imbalances associated with the U.S. current account deficit have given rise to speculation about the nature of the impending adjustment: Will it be smooth and gradual, or will it be sudden and costly? This paper summarizes the two views and then considers three historical periods with...

One of the world’s foremost economic historians explains the forces behind the development of modern central banks, providing insight into their role in the financial system and the economy.

We show that the size of the French public debt, the budget deficit and the monetary overhang made it impossible to stabilize immediately after World War I, even on the anti-keynesian assumption that a stabilization would have had no negative effects on income. The reason for the immediate...

In 1929, the Canadian government floated the exchange rate, which stayed at parity with sterling until 1931, when the Canadian dollar appreciated with respect to sterling and depreciated with respect to the U.S. dollar. This paper uses Robert J. Barro and David B. Gordon's reputation theory to...

The deterioration in the U.S. balance of payments after 1957 and an accelerating loss of gold reserves prompted U.S. monetary authorities to undertake foreign-exchange-market interventions beginning in 1961. We discuss the events leading up to these interventions, the institutional arrangements...

In this paper, we show that the monetary rule followed by a number of key countries before 1914 represented a commitment technology preventing the monetary authorities from changing planned future policy. The experiences of these major countries suggest that the gold standard was intended as a...