I am not convinced.

Let’s consider the interest argument, which is really the big-ticket item. First, the McKinsey number appears to apply only to Federal borrowings. But the entire cost of capital in the US is linked to what the government must pay for money. The benefit is enormous.

The argument that we push rates back up by borrowing more cuts both ways. Yes, we borrow more, because reserve status enables us to borrow more without rates rising prohibitively. In other words, we spend the interest rate benefit to maintain full employment. Isn’t that a benefit? No reserve status, no full employment. (We can argue about whether extending the privilege of Biblical punishment — by the sweat of thy brow, etc., — is a benefit some other time.)

Higher prices? International trade is about comparative advantage, not absolute advantage. Whatever our outputs cost, it will be in the mutual interest of us and our trading partners to trade what we make most cheaply for what they make most cheaply. The currency issue doubtless affects what we have a comparative advantage in, so any given company can complain that it would have sold more stuff if the dollar were weaker, but some other producer is selling more because its cost of capital is lower. Our low cost of capital, thanks to our currency’s reserve status, makes us competitive in capital-intensive goods.

We also have a comparative advantage in distribution to Americans, a very valuable service that only we can provide. Selling to us requires paying us for credit, advertising, transportation, communication, energy, etc. Those are all “exports” in existential terms to the extent that they are used by our trading partners to get their goods to market here so they can get dollars.

At the end of the day, of course, we must run a trade deficit to provide dollars for others to own. But we can do that by importing more, thereby creating jobs in distribution, not exporting less.

The real problem with issuing the reserve currency is that the fiscal deficit necessary to absorb trade deficit dollars may not be politically sustainable. Absent a supply of Treasuries, trade deficit dollars buy up real assets and bogus assets (toxic mortgages, anyone?). Bill Clinton cut the deficit just as the trade deficit was ballooning. Wall St. filled the AAA-paper gap with crap. 1993 was when we should have gone whole hog to fix the infrastructure. Instead, we ran a surplus so that bond traders could make money. A truly shameful and, ultimately, destructive waste of the exorbitant privilege.

Reserve status is a byproduct of strength and stability. To eschew it is to miss what all that hard work has won. Electing Trump as President suggests we are not worthy of issuing the world’s reserve currency, that we are not sufficiently stable, that our currency cannot be trusted. Does anyone doubt that he would renege on Treasury bonds as a bargaining tactic? Maybe we’ll find out what reserve status is worth when it goes away. Or maybe we’ll come to our senses and elect a President who can restore our credibility.