EconPapers    
Economics at your fingertips  
 

China�s exchange rate policy: the case against abandoning the dollar peg

James Laurenceson

No 105, EAERG Discussion Paper Series from University of Queensland, School of Economics

Abstract: This paper critically comments on the policy literature surrounding China�s exchange rate regime. It first seeks to expose as myths several popularly raised contentions regarding the dollar peg employed by China, including the belief that the RMB is clearly undervalued and that its value is a prominent cause of the U.S trade deficit. The paper then describes a consensus position that has emerged which argues that in the interests of better promoting its own macroeconomic stability, China should abandon the peg in favor of a more flexible exchange rate regime. We see numerous weaknesses in this position but a few stand out. Available data do not suggest that flexible regimes outperform fixed regimes in terms of inflationary outcomes. Moving to a flexible regime is also far from proximate policy response to the problems that are in evidence in China�s economy. Institutional realities that make moving to a flexible regime difficult also appear to have been seriously overlooked. The paper concludes by noting that in the longer term moving to a more flexible regime may be in China�s best interests. But for now, the focus needs to be firmly in the area of domestic financial reform.

New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-fmk, nep-ifn and nep-tra
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.uq.edu.au/economics/eaerg/dp/0105.pdf (application/pdf)
Our link check indicates that this URL is bad, the error code is: 404 Not Found

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:qld:uqeaer:01

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in EAERG Discussion Paper Series from University of Queensland, School of Economics Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SOE IT ().

 
Page updated 2025-03-22
Handle: RePEc:qld:uqeaer:01