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Comment by senko | Hacker News Reader

What, if I (a European) decide not to buy American treasuries, a squad of Marines is going to bust my front door?

What will you buy instead? The point is that the dollar is strong not purely because the American economy has been (and continues to be) the largest on the planet, but also because it is not currently possible to topple the US since its global activities are tied strongly to its military.

The only realistic options that exist at the moment are going back to the gold standard (not viable for most countries) or shifting to the yen (which is tied to the dollar as Japan is the largest holder of treasuries).

When Trump was elected, I clicked the sell button on the US treasuries and the buy button on the European ones. Was pretty easy.

It will be more costly for the people doing this later, of course.

Actually less, if like the long-term trend holds

treasuries are overwhelmingly impacted by federal reserve policy, not sure why you think trump would have much to do with it. if you compare US vs european treasuries since 2016 it's sort of a wash - the european ones are barely outperforming US ones, but the US ones consistently had better yields. and the big impact on US treasuries was interest rate changes, something trump has no say in

If you decided to trade oil in euros then a squad of aircraft carriers parks off your coast

See: Irak, Libia

No, but that military might turn a blind eye when your trade routes are threatened, or might decide to offshore balance against you.

Liberals are like libertarians in this regard. Housecats that don't understand what the actual source of stability and prosperity is.

No, we just won’t rescue you next time you guys do stupid things.

Your president said we had "not a great day" the last time you rescued us.

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