The US Dollar as the Basis of Trade

40% of all transactions on the planet are in US dollars. So you've got to borrow American dollars to have American dollars to get involved in trade. And that therefore means there's more demand for American dollars over and above than a man for American goods, which means you strengthen the financial sector and weaken the industrial. It's a large part of why we've had a financialized global economy. It's the reason where the power for the financial sector has come from. In some ways Bretton Woods as it was executed, versus how it was supposed to be, has set up the terms for the financialization of the post-war economy.