{"id":5203,"date":"2010-11-14T19:51:59","date_gmt":"2010-11-15T00:51:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/?p=5203"},"modified":"2010-11-15T13:44:52","modified_gmt":"2010-11-15T18:44:52","slug":"economist-ha-joon-chang-on-the-g20-summit-currency-wars-and-why-the-free-market-is-a-myth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/2010\/11\/14\/economist-ha-joon-chang-on-the-g20-summit-currency-wars-and-why-the-free-market-is-a-myth\/","title":{"rendered":"Economist Ha-Joon Chang on the G20 Summit, Currency Wars and Why the Free Market is a “Myth”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Watch the 20 minute video of the interview\u00a0 Economist Ha-Joon Chang on the G20 Summit, Currency Wars and Why the Free Market is a “Myth”<\/strong><\/a> from the website democracynow.org<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n

Here is an example response to whet your appetitie:<\/p>\n

HA-JOON CHANG: Well, you know, it is quite understandable why Americans are kind of frustrated by the slowness in the adjustment of Chinese currency. I mean, let\u2019s get the facts right. I mean, it has been adjusted, only very, very slowly, so it\u2019s not like China is absolutely refusing to move. But, yes, I mean, given the imbalances that U.S.A. is facing, it looks painfully slow. But on the Chinese side, you have to understand this. I mean, first of all, they don\u2019t want the kind of abrupt adjustment that Japan had to make to its own currency in the 1980s in the so-called Plaza Accord, which then created this huge financial bubble, destroyed the Japanese economy. So the Chinese want to do it slowly.<\/p>\n

And secondly, you know, it\u2019s not just China who “manipulates” currency value, as you just said. I mean, the Fed flooding the American economy with this money is also currency manipulation. So the Chinese are rightly upset.<\/p>\n

But on the other hand, yes, I mean, the problem is that, since the ’70s, we have lived under the kind of notion that only the deficit countries have to make adjustment. You know, surplus countries have to make adjustment, too, but in the last 30 years the reigning orthodoxy has been that, you know, anyone who’s spending beyond his means has to be punished. I mean, this is exactly the logic behind the punishment of third world countries in the debt crisis, and later Asian economies and the Argentinean economy. So, in that sense, it\u2019s that, actually, that the very thing that the U.S. have been trying to impose on the world are coming to haunt itself, you know, because the U.S. has been on the forefront of this logic that it\u2019s only the deficit countries that have to make adjustment, and now other countries are legitimately saying, “Well, why don\u2019t you then do the same?”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Were you even aware of “…1980s in the so-called Plaza Accord<\/strong><\/a>, which then created this huge financial bubble, destroyed the Japanese economy.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Watch the 20 minute video of the interview\u00a0 Economist Ha-Joon Chang on the G20 Summit, Currency Wars and Why the Free Market is a “Myth” from the website democracynow.org. Here is an example response to whet your appetitie: HA-JOON CHANG: Well, you know, it is quite understandable why Americans are kind of frustrated by the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[166],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-5203","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-stevegsposts","7":"czr-hentry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5203","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5203"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5203\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5210,"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5203\/revisions\/5210"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5203"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}