Europe and Japan, the two other large advanced economies, face crises that are, arguably, far more acute. In the aftermath of an earthquake, a tsunami and a still unfolding nuclear disaster, Japan is struggling through a recession.

In Europe, the probabilities have risen that Greece will need another bailout or will need to restructure its debt or default on it. Ireland and Portugal, which have also needed bailouts, are also troubled, and the European Union has so far been unable to come up with a solution. Leaders of the Group of 8 nations meeting in Deauville, France, on Thursday and Friday failed to make significant headway on these issues.

Meanwhile, growth in red-hot emerging market countries like China has begun to slow, as their central bankers raise interest rates to limit inflation.

Given the alternatives, the bond market has found United States debt quite appealing. The market is convinced that in the end, Washington politicians will trim the budget deficit, Mr. Minerd said. If that perception were to change, the market would react with vehemence, he said. “I think everyone expects that Congress will come to its senses before it’s too late,” he said.

With signs that economic growth is slowing — rattling the stock and commodity markets — the Fed is likely to hold interest rates near zero for months, he said, and Treasury yields are likely to dip even lower, meaning more profits for bond traders.

By this summer, industrial growth will be visibly slowing around the world, said Lakshman Achuthan, the managing director of the Economic Cycle Research Institute, a private forecasting group. The markets have probably reacted to early indications of that slowdown, he said, bolstering bonds and hurting stocks and commodities. “Until there are signs of another pickup in economic growth,” he said, “I wouldn’t be buying on dips in the stock market.” In this context, he said, Treasuries may seem a safer bet.

William H. Gross, the co-chief investment officer of the Pacific Investment Management Company, or Pimco, the world’s biggest bond manager, ruefully compared investors in Treasuries to complacent frogs sitting in a pot of slowly heating water. “Bond investors are receiving almost nothing for their money, and the situation is getting worse and worse. But they’ve gotten used to it. They don’t realize how bad it is. And before they know it, well, they’ll be cooked.”