The U.S. dollar has served as the key currency of the international economic/financial system for over fifty years. This study assesses the proposition that the series of U.S. current-account deficits over the last twenty years will shortly exhaust the capability of the dollar to continue as the key currency.

H. PETER GRAY is Professor Emeritus of International Economics and Business at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey and at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute of Troy, New York, USA. He is a past president of both the Eastern Economic Association and of the International Trade and Finance Association.