Damn that history...

Each day, the United States must borrow billions of dollars from abroad to finance its enormous budget and trade deficits. Without a steady stream of huge loans, the country would face rising interest rates, higher inflation, a dropping dollar and slower economic growth. The lenders want to see less of a gap between what the government collects in taxes and what it spends, because a lower budget deficit always eases a trade deficit. A lower trade deficit also implies a stronger dollar. And a stronger dollar would reassure foreign investors that dollar-based assets remain their best choice.

I've been reading a fair bit of nineteenth-century Latin American history over the weekend, getting ready for a midterm tomorrow. This quote might well have been taken from one of the articles that I've read. A government reliant on foreign investment and foreign loans simply to function day-to-day. The only difference, perhaps, is that the current United States government doesn't face a well-armed populace headed by strongmen waiting for the central government to misstep to pull of a coup in their favour.