At the close of the Second World War, the United States represented almost a third of world GDP and an even larger share of manufacturing. The proportion is stark: the UN’s World Economic Report for 1948 breaks a chart of global manufacturing down into two roughly equal halves: the United States and “Other”. At the time, it was unquestionable that if there were to be a global reserve currency, it would be the U.S. dollar. At the Bretton Woods conference in 1944, this was codified into a...
