Posted on 08/14/2008 3:01:41 PM PDT by djsherin
Money is a crucial command post of any economy, and therefore of any society. Society rests upon a network of voluntary exchanges, also known as the "free-market economy"; these exchanges imply a division of labor in society, in which producers of eggs, nails, horses, lumber, and immaterial services such as teaching, medical care, and concerts, exchange their goods for the goods of others. At each step of the way, every participant in exchange benefits immeasurably, for if everyone were forced to be self-sufficient, those few who managed to survive would be reduced to a pitiful standard of living.
Direct exchange of goods and services, also known as "barter," is hopelessly unproductive beyond the most primitive level, and indeed every "primitive" tribe soon found its way to the discovery of the tremendous benefits of arriving, on the market, at one particularly marketable commodity, one in general demand, to use as a "medium" of "indirect exchange." If a particular commodity is in widespread use as a medium in a society, then that general medium of exchange is called "money."
The money-commodity becomes one term in every single one of the innumerable exchanges in the market economy. I sell my services as a teacher for money; I use that money to buy groceries, typewriters, or travel accommodations; and these producers in turn use the money to pay their workers, to buy equipment and inventory, and pay rent for their buildings. Hence the ever-present temptation for one or more groups to seize control of the vital money-supply function.
(Excerpt) Read more at mises.org ...
Thanks for posting, I love just about anything from Mises.
Here’s a link to some REAL money, not that silly Federal Reserve stuff: http://www.libertydollar.org/
What I love about this article is about half or 2/3 of the way down he talks about how to restore the gold standard. I always here we only have $11 billion dollars in gold reserves at Fort Knox, but what I didn’t realize was that the government uses it’s rate of $42.22 per ounce. Using the more accurate market rate of lets say $850 (I think it’s around there) per ounce, we actually have $223 billion in gold reserves.
The important part though is how many ounces of gold we have, that way whatever the value of gold per ounce, you can always calculate the value of the gold we have in reserve at Fort Knox. We have 262.9 million ounces of gold btw.
The Fed - we’ve now almost endured a full century under the ultimate slave-master...all of us.
And you’ve actually seen this gold you speak of at Fort Knox?
ping
No, but in theory it’s there. Eventually I have to go to Fort Knox for training I believe... maybe they’ll let me see the gold reserves (I can hope right?). But maybe I’m thinking of something completely different.
Um, $223BN is a bit less than the dollars in circulation.
Just a weeeee bit.
Going back to the gold standard would tank the world economy.
Good luck in your training, and thank you for your service to our great nation.
I have my doubts about anything at all being there.
The amount of dollars in circulation is less than the amount of US money in circulation (fractional reserve banking), but I agree the number couldn’t be $850 per ounce if it were to happen in one step. If you haven’t read the article and check out that site. I’ve learned a lot about monetary policy in general (not just about the gold standard) and it’s been extremely intriguing.
Thank you.
And a very apprehensive part of me shares your concern.
Exactly:
I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.
—Thomas Jefferson, Letter to the Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin (1802)
Thanks, but I avoid monetary policy like I avoid the IRS. As a mathematician, it makes my head hurt.
The world economy is a product of government, not free individuals.
It deserves to be tanked.
Before studying real economics and monetary policy (and central banking/federal reserve) I had never heard this quote. Now I’ve heard it dozens of times from multiple sources. I love it and I wish more people were exposed to these kinds of quotes.
“The colonies would gladly have borne the little tax on tea and other matters had it not been that England took away from the colonies their money, which created unemployment and dissatisfaction. The inability of the colonists to get power to issue their own money permanently out of the hands of George III and the international bankers was the PRIME reason for the Revolutionary War.” —Benjamin Franklin
Yes, it was a wierd little footnote in history that I had never heard before either. That colonial money was a very potent threat to the throne, and unless one understands the nature of what money is, it’s impossible to understand how threatening such a policy was. But George knew!
“Give me control of a nation’s currency and I care not who makes the laws “
- Baron Rothschild
One of the writers of the Federal Reserve Act.
Scary isn’t it? Even Wilson of all people regretted signing the act into law.
Yup, done quite a bit of reading/research....we’ve been screwed for a good long time now and few people know it.
In theory.
Methinks you are way optimistic.
I assume there is actually little or none there.
Which is why we had to be taken off the gold standard in the first place. Just my opinion.
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