The Export-Import Bank and U.S. Foreign Economic Relations

This is a highly detailed account of the operations and development of the Export-Import Bank of Washington established in 1934 and renamed the Export-Import Bank in 1945. Its original purpose was to be the U.S. government agent for trading with the Soviet Union, which the Roosevelt administration had finally recognized the previous year. It was also intended that it should make some amends for the banking failure to provide export financing for U.S. companies. In fact its role vis-à-vis the Soviet Union was soon eclipsed, first by activities in the Western Hemisphere, then successively by wartime, Cold War, and post–Cold War activities, all geared to one extent or another toward promoting U.S. exports, overseas development, and U.S. foreign policy objectives. The bank gradually developed into “two institutions,” one for lending and one for guarantees and insurance (pp. 110–11). It also gathered different emphases over the years, especially in response to the decline in U.S. competitiveness and the serious balance of trade deficit that took hold in the early 1970s, and in the late 1990s it engaged with the difficulty caused by the flight of private capital from the Asian economies

Administration (probate law · Balance of trade · Business · Capital (architecture · Cold war · Economic policy · Economics · Economy · Foreign capital · Foreign direct investment · Geography · Government (linguistics · International economics · International trade · Political science · Politics · Private capital · Soviet union · Global Financial Crisis and Policies · Global trade and economics