Hi repeater.
I am not a financial advisor, and please consider all opinions, since I could very well be wrong, but I had major interests in the USD and faced similar questions. After reading everything I could to better understand the US economy, the dollar and my position relative to it, I decided to sell my property and dollars. This came from many conclusions:
1. US debt including unfunded liabilities is over 50 trillion dollars.
2. I do not believe US politicians or the people have the stomach for the kind of cuts necessary to bring down this debt and therefore to increase savings and in turn boost production and return the US to health- I think it will need a crisis for this action.
3. In the mean time, the only two practical options the US has are inflation or a structured default.
4. Apparently, the US has chosen inflation (QE 1 and 2 (3???), monetising debt (bond/treasury sales) aka- money printing!), hoping to erode the value of the dollar and thus inflate away its debts while incorrectly pinning it's hopes on consumer spending to grow its way out.
5. Consumer spending emphatically does not grow an economy, cannot measure wealth and is not a measure of growth. Unfortunately, the US economy (and many others) has been based on this fallacy for years. Savings are an indication of wealth and production indicates growth . Consumption is an indication of...well, consumption . In short, the strength of the US economy is a misnomer- in terms of its savings and production relative to debt it is desperately weak.
As a crude analogy- imagine the position of a wealthy, successful professional (the US). He is outwardly smart, healthy and everyone looks to him with envy and admiration. Seeing the wealth, the local bank, (the Chinese and others) is desperate to lend him money and as fortune would have it (for the bank), he is happy live it up. Even though he's wealthy, he spends and spends and spends, taking out more and more loans over the years- that represents consumer and public spending over time. Eventually, he finds himself so deep in debt, he can't even pay his overdraft which is the deficit. So he asks for more and more loans from the bank (QE1/QE2-bonds) to cover his overdraft spending. The bank (US creditors) have loaned unwisely and are now scared this is the only way to get any of their money back- to tide him over. At this point, our professional hasn't even considered how he will make the payment on his "recent buy now, pay later house furnishing" and that represents the many unfunded liabilities such as social security payments.
On top of everything, that rich living has left our professional in poor health. He smoked too much and drank too much (the move away from free markets and savings based investment and production) and while he has made some incrimental improvements to his skills, he is hasn't been able to match his capability to earn with his debt load. Rumours (market shorts) begin to circulate that our professional is not as wealthy as everyone thinks to which he replies "you guys are full of it- how could I possibly be poor- just look at my spending! Many who have always known our successful professional cannot imagine this man's terrible health and finances and his claim that his spending is a result of wealth is accepted. This represents the misguided conventional understanding of America's position.
Anyway, that's my take on it and to cut a long story short, I was and am sufficiently alarmed to significantly restructure my life and finances away from the dollar. How and when exactly a sharper devaluation will play out, I cannot conclude. I think the Chinese and others see themselves in a precarious position so that is delaying things, but there has to be a tipping point and who knows what that will be. Maybe it takes ten years, maybe three, maybe one ? One thing is clear to me though and that is dollar denominated assets are going to devalue in real terms. I should say that I have no more plans to live in the US and if I had it might have led me to actually invest carefully in property, but that is another matter.
Again, just for emphasis, this is just my opinion and and experience, so please look for others. May your choice be the best one.