Costa Rica News – Well this could mean that all those people that are looking at trying to escape the USA by coming to Costa Rica will have yet another tie to home. Costa Rica is weighing up the possibility of adopting the dollar as its currency.
Salvadoran economist Manuel Hinds discussed in Costa Rica the pros and cons of dollarization, using the example of El Salvador and Panama.
A newspaper from El Salvador reported that “many government economists advocate keeping their local currency because they believe that inflation will remain low, but Hinds explained that the opposite happens.
In the region, El Salvador, and Panama, which are dollarized, have the lowest inflation rates while countries like Argentina and Venezuela have an inflation rate of more than two digits (25% and 10% respectively) while last year, inflation in El Salvador was only 0.8%. ”
“The expectation in the financial sector is that by keeping the local currency interest rates will be lower, but International Monetary Fund data indicates that they are higher in countries with monetary policy.”
Honduras for example had a real lending rate of 11.3% in February of this year, while in El Salvador it was only 3.8%. ” According to the economist, “interest rates in a country’s own currency are more variable”.
What are your opinions for people currently living in Costa Rica or thinking of moving here?
Post in the comments.