>Really? Everything I buy and earn is in dollars. Foreign goods will become more expensive (already have) as the dollar sinks against other currencies, but I don't understand why I should hold money in those currencies unless I am worried about the dollar becoming worthless, which I am not.
That is precisely my worry. I heard that some companies are investing in dollars now; the argument being more or less that it is low now, and it should eventually go up again. So, logically, now is a good time to buy dollars. Let other people try this; I won't.
(On the other hand, foreign goods becoming more expensive can, interestingly, become a problem for other countries: they will have trouble being competitive, when exporting to the U.S.)
> If I put my money in Euros, for example, isn't that an investment / speculation that Euros will appreciate against the dollar?
Yes, but I think I didn't suggest a SINGLE foreign currency. Diversification might be safer.
> I am looking for a safe haven, not an investment. Not forever, just to ride things out for a while.
Me too; and I am trying not to have all my money (what little I have <g>) in US-Dollars, not all in Bolivianos, and not even all in Euros, even though the Euro does seem, for now, to be safer than the other two I mentioned. But yet, I don't suggest that anybody bet their future on the Euro either.
Difference in opinions hath cost many millions of lives: for instance, whether flesh be bread, or bread be flesh; whether whistling be a vice or a virtue; whether it be better to kiss a post, or throw it into the fire... (from Gulliver's Travels)