CAMBRIDGE, Massachusetts/Washington, D.C. — In a 1955 speech to a group of investment bankers, then-United States Federal Reserve (Fed) chairman William McChesney Martin shared a story about an economics professor who always administered the same exam. When asked how any student could possibly fail such a test, the professor replied: 'The questions don't change, but the answers do.'

This story remains relevant today, and not just for Martin's successors at the Fed. The ongoing debate about the health of the dollar is often framed in binary terms: either its status as a global reserve currency is rapidly eroding, owing to geopolitics and US fiscal policies, or it remains the unrivaled dominant currency with no competition in sight.