Having the World's Reserve Currency Does Not Mean the U.S. Has to Run Huge Trade Deficits

We can always count on Robert Samuelson to give us some economic misinformation on Monday morning and he didn't let us down this week. In a very balanced column (yes, many tons of sarcasm here) decrying the economic proposals of both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton he told readers:

"The United States runs chronic trade deficits because the dollar serves as the main global currency. This raises its exchange rate, putting U.S. manufacturers at a disadvantage."

This is wrong at just about every...