Opinion | Is the U.S. Dollar Really in Danger? – The New York Times

The dollar is about to become “toilet paper,” says Robert Kyosaki, author of “Rich Dad, Poor Dad.” “Get rid of your U.S. dollars now,” says the investor and economic commentator Peter Schiff. They aren’t alone: I’m seeing a lot of stuff like this in my inbox lately.

Now, some of this is coming from “Weimarists,” people who are always predicting hyperinflation. Schiff, for example, insisted back in 2009 that the Obama administration’s policies would cause runaway inflation. (For the record, they didn’t.) Still, as it says on investment prospectuses, past performance is no guarantee of future results: People who have been consistently wrong in the past could be right in the future.

And today’s Weimarists have a new argument. Recently a number of countries, alarmed or maybe just annoyed by what they perceive as the weaponization of the dollar against Vladimir Putin, have been taking at least symbolic steps to reduce the dollar’s role in the world economy. For example, China has asked oil producers to accept payments in yuan instead of dollars.

This has even relatively sober commentators like Fareed Zakaria warning that the dollar’s status as the world’s reserve currency is at risk. And losing reserve-currency status, many people imagine, would be an economic catastrophe for America.