The dollar glut is a term for the accumulation of American dollars outside of the United States, contrasted with the dollar gap, which lead to the creation of the Marshall Plan following World War II. The eventual shift to a dollar glut forced the end of the gold standard in the United States and led to the collapse of the Bretton Woods system.
The stability of the Bretton Woods system came to depend upon the ability of the US government to exchange dollars for gold at $35 an ounce. The American ability to fulfill this commitment began to diminish as the postwar dollar shortage was transformed into an overabundance of dollars, also known as the dollar glut.
Famous quotes containing the words dollar and/or glut:
“I favor the policy of economy, not because I wish to save money, but because I wish to save people. The men and women of this country who toil are the ones who bear the cost of the Government. Every dollar that we carelessly waste means that their life will be so much the more meager. Every dollar that we prudently save means that their life will be so much the more abundant. Economy is idealism in its most practical terms.”
—Calvin Coolidge (18721933)
“Removed from its more restrictive sense, masturbation has become an expression for everything that has proved, for lack of human contact, to be void of meaning. We have communication problems, suffer from egocentrism and narcissism, are frustrated by information glut and loss of environment; we stagnate despite the rising GNP.”
—Günther Grass (b. 1927)