The U.S. dollar is the lingua franca of the global financial system. The fact that so much of the world relies on our currency has long been understood as our exorbitant privilege — the reason we have so much leverage in the global economy and are able to borrow at lower interest rates.

But the Trump administration has a much more complicated relationship with the dollar. It has come to see dollar dominance as a burden we bear on behalf of the rest of the world. But in its attempts to move away from dollar dominance, is the Trump administration on the verge of creating a financial crisis?

Kenneth Rogoff is a former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund and a professor of economics at Harvard University. He has a book coming out called “Our Dollar, Your Problem.” In this conversation he walks through the history of dollar dominance, why it’s been waning in recent years and what ripple effects the Trump administration’s policies might have.

0:00 Intro
2:27 The basics of dollar dominance
5:38 How the U.S. benefits
10:40 Effects on U.S. manufacturing
18:56 International perspectives
23:15 Trump’s threats to the system
32:00 Tariffs and the dollar
40:00 Can the damage be un-done?
48:55 Is a financial crisis on the horizon?
56:56 What could replace dollar dominance
1:01:14 Book recommendations

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You can find transcripts (posted midday) and more episodes of “The Ezra Klein Show” at nytimes.com/ezra-klein-podcast. Book recommendations from all our guests are listed at https://www.nytimes.com/article/ezra-klein-show-book-recs.html