During the quarter century of severe U.S. monetary inflation starting in the mid-1990s, the rest of the world failed to implement defensive strategies against its spread. In contrast, during the U.S.’ greatest peacetime inflation from the late 1960s to the late 1970s, there was powerful and increasingly successful defence against the spread of monetary inflation by the U.S. hegemon, most notably in Germany. How to explain the difference? This latest episode of monetary inflation had a larger manifestation in asset inflation and a smaller one in goods and services inflation. Asset inflation enjoyed considerable popularity in its sometimes long active phase, before the bust phase and aftermath. Moreover, there is no widespread recognition of how asset inflation takes its toll eventually on economic prosperity while high goods and services inflation generates much popular resentment. The most effective defence strategies against the spread of asset inflation from the U.S. hegemon are in countries where the monetary regime can be firmly anchored independent of the dollar. Defence cannot be total given that asset inflation has greater potential than goods and services inflation to cross currency frontiers. Even so, well-designed defence can limit substantially the damage to national prosperity from the U.S. monetary hegemon pursuing virulent U.S. asset inflation. The paper concludes with case-studies on why three countries, Japan, Switzerland and Israel, failed to erect effective defences during the most recent episode of U.S. monetary inflation.

在 19 世纪 90 年代中期开始的美国货币严重通胀的四分之一个世纪中，世界其他地区未能实施防御性策略以防止其蔓延。相比之下，在 1960 年代末到 1970 年代末美国和平时期最严重的通货膨胀期间，美国霸权（尤其是在德国）对货币通货膨胀的蔓延进行了强有力且日益成功的防御。如何解释差异？最新一轮的货币通胀在资产通胀方面表现得更大，在商品和服务通胀方面表现得更小。资产通胀在其有时很长的活跃阶段、在萧条阶段之前和之后的阶段非常受欢迎。而且，资产通胀最终如何对经济繁荣产生影响，而商品和服务的高通胀却引起了广泛的不满，这一点尚未得到广泛认可。防止美国霸权资产通胀蔓延的最有效防御策略是在货币制度可以独立于美元之外的国家。鉴于资产通胀比商品和服务通胀具有更大的跨越货币边界的潜力，防御不可能是全面的。即便如此，精心设计的防御可以在很大程度上限制美国货币霸权追求恶性美国资产通胀对国家繁荣的损害。这篇论文最后通过案例研究来说明为什么日本、瑞士和以色列这三个国家在最近的美国货币通胀期间未能建立有效的防御措施。