Is the world economy dependent on the American economy?
Yes. This really shouldn't be a question.
When a country has the world reserve currency, the rest of the world kind of really becomes dependent on that country. When the currency of choice is used to trade 90% of goods between countries, it becomes very important to see that country succeed.
As it stands, the world is incredibly dependent on the US economy, and it will not change until a country like China takes over the world currency position, which would throw the US into serious turmoil, e.g. Britain once the Pound was replaced as the world reserve currency.
The whole world is not totally depending on US economy but until now lot of new products are invented from USA so they will patent their new technology and who ever buys it must pay the fee for it so indirectly many countries are depended on USA. If slowly new inventions comes from other part of the world than there hold will slowly reduce and currently it is already happening. So or later no one will be depending on USA economy.
Well they aren't -technically- dependent on the US economy, as many countries could hypothetically function without the USD serving as a medium for trade. It's just the as the world economy currently functions, each economy is fairly dependent on the USD to retain its value. Now even if the US was to tank, the only difference would be the USD being valued considerably lower, but it would not necessarily make any other huge issues as long as it remains the world reserve currency. The real issue comes from every other sort of security that exists, such as bonds or stocks.
Is the world economy dependent on the American economy?
Yes. This really shouldn't be a question.
When a country has the world reserve currency, the rest of the world kind of really becomes dependent on that country. When the currency of choice is used to trade 90% of goods between countries, it becomes very important to see that country succeed
It cuts both ways. The reserve status of the US dollar leads to a conflict of "interests", since there is a fundamental antagonism between the US national and global interests, where the former is sought to pursue a current account surplus (to maintain confidence in the US dollar), while the latter requires a current account deficit (to maintain the US dollar as a global reserve currency). Long term, this system is unsustainable (due to imbalances piling up), and everything should eventually go topsy-turvy...
This is known as Triffin's Paradox
Ah, the joy of economics.