March 23, 2025 — What is to be made of proposals for a “Mar-a-Lago Accord” coming from some Trump devotees, notably Stephen Miran? (He is the new Chair of President Trump’s Council of Economic Advisers.)
Sometime during the next 3 years and 10 months, Trump could well find some event that he will want to trumpet under the name of his Florida residence. But the Mar-a-Lago Accord about which people are talking, regarding the dollar, doesn’t stand a chance.
- The return of international coordination?
The proposal comprises an effort, coordinated among large countries, to intervene to depreciate the dollar, in hopes of improving the US trade balance. That much resembles the successful 1985 Plaza Accord, which is said to be its inspiration.
One could imagine a sensible proposal for concerted intervention to bring down the dollar from its height, coordinated with American steps to cut its budget deficit and steps by Germany and China to increase their budget deficits, thus helping to address the fundamental causes of the international trade imbalances. But this is not that.