It makes me angry when a US citizen claims that other countries profited and the US took one for the team. It's so disgusting. People trading in US currency are really trading in worthless papers and it all works only if they pile on more and more of those worthless papers cause the US can never return what they took from the world. Chinese trade surplus is China providing more to the world than they consume but somehow that's good for China? Sure, good in terms of training that muscle but they've been working for funny money they will never be able to redeem for goods and services.
World trade is not a zero sum game and there are things that are a global net negative and others that are global net positive, so maybe Bretton Woods was a net positive as it oiled global trade but as soon as the US started to abuse it to engage in endless wars it turned into a net negative for the average earthling while some few in the US filled their pockets.
