Well, gee...
pafrmu said:
Originally Posted by Herself: "'Money' and 'wealth' are not identical. Like choosing a gun, you should critically evaluate the suitability of a particular tool for the task you intend to accomplish."
I cannot agree more.
Gold, Silver, Wampum etc. are a bad means of exchange and store of long term value.
Can you support that assertion? Bear in mind that the same amount of gold that would buy a fine toga in ancient Rome will buy you a nice suit today!
pafrmu said:
I would just say that if you were immigrating to Slobnicivia you would be better off bringing a commonly accepted currency there than just gold. If its not stable enough to support currency its not stable enough to prevent someone from "emptying" your handcart without your permission.
I would question why any "commonly accepted currency*" would need "support!"
I'd also wonder why you would sit there next to your handcart and rely on any government to keep "someone" from taking your gold; me, I'd be after stopping the thief. The man who sprint away with 125 pounds of gold
and fight you at the same time is vanishingly rare.
* "Currency," is that really the word you meant? It generally refers to coins and is often taken to mean conductor-metal coins rather than the modern base-metal or plastic slugs used in most nations. Might as well be the metal itself!
If you trust goverments, use their money. I don't trust 'em especially, so I prefer tangible assets, genereally ones of a useful nature. Like, for instance, guns. YMMV.
jnojr said:
Fiat currency isn't all bad... it's worth is determined by something a little bigger than todays demand for a given item. Even if Washington DC were to go up in a mushroom cloud, that wouldn't mean the death of the United States of America... as long as enough people still had faith in the US, paper dollars would continue to be "worth" something.
Wanna bet? The fact is, those paper dollars are worth a little less each and every day. Today's dollar is your father's dime. A catastrophic event (heavens forfend!) could yank the bottom right out from under. Even a big EMP could do the job. Suddenly, you've got some nicely printed paper, period. Fiat money is only worth anything while there's a fiat; it's really just playing pretend. When the game ends, all debts, savings and incomes are gone.
jnojr said:
Besides, think of the limiting effect the gold standard would have on our economy. There's only so much gold under the control of the US government. Why would we want that to be the upper cap on our growth?
What, the limit would be hit and everything would come to a screeching halt? Not likely! Doesn't work that way. The (very elastic, there's more of it every day) limit to gold is a cap on
inflation, not growth.
As far as The U. S. Governmnet is concerned, I'm not at all clear why they're even in the loop. They take in income and pay debts, just like any other economic entity; they do not create wealth, that's what We The People do. If various fungible commodities were the medium of exchange, the Government woud be just one coiner among many; or they might not bother to do so at all.
The monetary provisions in the Constitution all concern what the government will use to pay its debts, not what means you and I will use to buy and sell.
--Herself
, Art