Robert Triffin

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Robert Triffin (October 5, 1911; Flobecq, Belgium – February 23, 1993; Ostend, Belgium) was a Belgian economist best known for his critique of the Bretton Woods system, later known as Triffin's dilemma.

He received his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1938 and taught there from 1939 until 1942. He held positions in the U.S. Federal Reserve System (1942-1946), the International Monetary Fund (1946-1948), and the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation (1948-1951), now the OECD. In 1951 he become a professor of economics at Yale University.

In 1960 he went before the United States Congress warning of serious flaws in the Bretton Woods System. His theory was based on observing the dollar glut, or the accumulation of the United States dollar outside of the U.S. Under the Bretton Woods agreement the U.S. had pledged to convert dollars into gold, but by the early 1960s the glut had caused more dollars to be available outside the U.S. than gold was in its Treasury. As a result the U.S. had to run balance of payments deficits to supply the world with dollar reserves that kept liquidity for their increased wealth. However, running the balance of payments deficits in the long term would erode confidence in the dollar. As a result over the long term he predicted that the system could not maintain both liquidity and confidence, a theory later to be known as the Triffin dilemma. It was largely ignored until 1971, when what he had hypothesized came to be, forcing U.S. President Richard Nixon to halt convertibility of the United States dollar into gold (see Nixon Shock). This shock led to the end of the Bretton Woods System.

A fundamental reform of the international monetary system has long been overdue. Its necessity and urgency are further highlighted today by the imminent threat to the once mighty U.S. dollar.

– Robert Triffin^[1]

Although he became a U.S. citizen in 1942, 1977 saw Triffin reclaim his Belgian citizenship and return to Europe. There he was a staunch supporter of European integration and helped to develop the European Monetary System and supported the idea of a central bank which would later come in the form of the European Central Bank.

[edit] Bibliography

Europe and the Money Muddle (1957)
Gold and the Dollar Crisis (1960)
Our International Monetary System: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow (1968)

[edit] Notes

^ System in Crisis (1959-1971). Money Matters: An IMF Exhibit -- The Importance of Global Cooperation. International Monetary Fund. Retrieved on 2006-04-06, 2006.

[edit] References

"Triffin, Robert." Britannica Book of the Year, 1994. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 6 Apr. 2006 <http://search.eb.com/eb/article-9113363>.
System in Crisis (1959-1971). Money Matters: An IMF Exhibit -- The Importance of Global Cooperation. International Monetary Fund. Retrieved on 2006-04-06, 2006.