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A Moment of Optimism in Our Financial Crisis

John Bradley "JJ" Jackson

08 Oct 2008 • 1 min read

While the stock market appears to be in a free fall and the business press is tossing around words like depression, doom, and chaos (irresponsibly, I may add), there is cause for optimism. The good news is that the US dollar is rising very quickly in value on the world market.

Last week the dollar was at the highest level in more than a year when compared to the Euro and other major currencies. Our purchasing power has surged dramatically which means that our nation just got a raise, so to speak.

We must remind ourselves about the power of the US dollar---the US is the standard for the world’s currencies. This must sound a little crazy, but despite the fact that our debt system seems in chaos, we stand to gain much from this situation.

On the consumer purchasing front, we will win big time with better prices for foreign made goods such as consumer electronics and imported automobiles. Additionally, this increase in the value of the dollar will provide us unusual political leverage when negotiating with other nations both friendly or not.

When other nations faced a similar a financial crisis as this, invariably the value of their currency fell. This compounded the financial pain. When Asia, Russia and Mexico had a similar debt crisis, their currencies collapsed which sent foreign investors to other markets. As confidence fell, so did their exchange rates which made matters worse.

The good news this week is that the world is running to the US dollar for safety which means we get the spoils. Heed my words: the good times are coming back.