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Article: Monetary muddle revisited. (interest rates and monetary policy) (Editorial)
- Article from:
- National Review
- Article date:
- January 20, 1992
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1992 National Review, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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THE FED cut the discount rate by a full percentage point, even as Germany's Bundesbank was pushing European interest rates in the opposite direction. One immediate effect was to sink the dollar, but that may prove temporary if Europeans, like the Japanese, realize that their real interest rates are unnecessarily high. With inflation way down in all major countries over the past year, a case could be made for simultaneous interest-rate cuts by all the G-7 countries. The case for the U.S. going it alone is more problematic, since there is no question that weakness of the dollar, if it persists, must risk relatively higher U.S. inflation. some argue that a weak dollar is good ...