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To: GraceZ who wrote (267640)	11/17/2003 7:17:11 PM
From: MulhollandDrive	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 436258

interesting read on where the euro may be headed... hsbc.com.tw

To: GraceZ who wrote (267640)	11/18/2003 5:45:31 AM
From: zonder	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 436258

why it is that the majority of Europe's gold resides in a vault in lower Manhattan Physical security? I thought we were talking about "trust in the stability (and value) of a currency" rather than physical security from theft etc. You know, the trust USD has been steadily losing over the past year or so, starting with Bernanke's famous Nov 2002 speech where he talked about printing money (with examples of how an alchemist producing gold would drive down the price of gold), and then continuing in no uncertain terms with Snow saying US still follows a "strong dollar" policy but now "strong currency" means "one that is hard to counterfeit". :-) While you may find the military actions brought about by this country to be offensive to you personally you should also acknowledge that a large part of the world, especially the EU depends on the US military might as well as it's economic strength for their own security and they have since WWII. My personal thoughts on the US foreign policy is irrelevant. I only mentioned it because the world seems to be noticing that the said policy is causing an interesting drain on the already strained US financial resources. This adds to the unpredictability, which is not good for a reserve currency. Perhaps this is one of the reasons they hate us so. Perhaps. Or perhaps they don't hate Americans but resent the current US foreign policy, as poll after poll has clearly shown. It's not a popularity contest. A currency's strength has to do with the underlying economic strength of the country. Which in turn is influenced by the said country's twin deficits and its newfound taste in spending copious amounts of money in invading countries and then building up the infrastructure it has demolished. Paying for all this from resources that could be spent in more productive, domestic areas. That's all I have been trying to say. Are you talking in theory or do you really believe this is possible, that you can control the prices of main inputs? I am talking from practice. Socialism is rather well defined, I didn't have to do it. "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs". That's communism, not socialism. The social states in Europe have nothing to do with "distributing according to need". You could even be hard-pressed in calling most of them "socialist". Their states' "social" attributes are basically high taxes which are then used for a social security system that covers pretty much everyone, and acts as a security net for the very poor, basically assuring that there are no homeless people begging on the streets. France is one of the most social states in Europe, but I doubt if one can make a convincing case to call it even "socialist", let alone "communist", which your definition above corresponds to. it's hard to believe that so much pain could have arisen from such a seemingly well intentioned statement. I agree. Classic example of how so many people's good intentions were ruined by human nature, which refused to sacrifice all for the common good. We are, of course, talking about the former Soviet Union and not EU states :-) stability, as you seem to have defined it, means that the value of the US dollar travels in a straight line? Not so simply. At least, "stability", as in a currency that isn't repeatedly beaten over the head by its own Fed and Administration, with the clear intention of decreasing its value. Can you blame central banks if they don't enjoy the US' obvious intention to lower the value of the USD and look elsewhere? >>>And its [EU's] member states don't really have to adapt a more capitalist stance for that to happen.<<< They do if they aren't going to take the same path that the Soviet Union took. I think you are exaggerating. My humble opinion, of course. Paying 80% of an employees operation costs following receipt of the bill or paying a guy sacked for redundancy half his salary for six months is hardly "a path the Soviet Union took". If you recall, there was no slippery slope in that "path", but a certain revolution. I have only been living in Europe for a couple of years, so maybe a European can enlighten us further on the subject. However, my understanding is that Europe does not want to be communist. They just want to have social state that they can rely on when out of a job, or if they just find out they have cancer. And they understand they have to pay higher taxes for all that, as well as to raise a bit the standards of life for the very poor. Whether the system is not as efficient as the pure capitalism of the US is of course another issue. Just trying to say I don't feel your fears of an imminent descent into the communist hell are justified...