18 Ecuador
Roberts
Ecuador dollarised its economy in January 2000 and price stability was achieved by 2004. From then on, inflation has been on average 3.1 per cent a year, lower than the 28 per cent average between 1970 and 1999, and similar to Chile’s 3.3 per cent), Colombia’s (4.4 per cent) and Peru’s (2.9 per cent) in the same period.
Ecuador’s dollarisation has been no great success for its economy. Ecuador was lucky when it dollarised because it could rely high oil revenues during the commodity price boom up to the mid-2010s. But after that, Ecuador was forced into cutting spending and raising taxes, which has aggravated a drop into recession in the last few years. Indeed, Ecuador has grown some 40% less than the rate achieved in the pre-dollarised years and Ecuador’s per capita income in 2019 was lower than in 2012.