Traditional economic symbols of national sovereignty are going the way of the dinosaur. Around the world, national airlines, telephone companies, banks, and other government-owned institutions, once bulwarks and extensions of the nation itself, are being privatized and placed under market control. In the aftermath of the financial crises of the 1990s, many of them sparked by drastic currency depreciations, it is time for policy

Global markets are adopting a single currency Illiquid national currencies are costly The trade-off A grand illusion....