Some of you are going to love this article.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/6c43927c-...144feabdc0.html

quote:

A few months ago, Terry Smith, head of Tullett Prebon, the interdealer broker, chaired a panel at the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos which was asked to produce one concrete recommendation to fix the global financial crisis. The top pick? Not anything on toxic assets or fiscal spending. Instead, this gaggle of leading financiers called for a new reserve currency, akin to an old-style gold standard. Two-thirds of the world’s assets are denominated in a fiat currency issued by a country whose authorities are taking policy actions which seem inevitably to lead to its debasement,” explains Mr Smith, noting that “it seems . . . the Chinese have now concluded that this is not acceptable. ... Most notably, this hedge fund points out that since the world abandoned the gold standard on August 15, 1971 credit creation has spiralled completely out of control.

Just because there is a roaring debate over it doesn't mean that one side isn't incorrigibly wrong. See Creationism.

___________________
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

**looks at thread**

considers posting...
shakes head..

**walks away**

There's really no doubt that it's for the best.

___________________
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

yep..I'm bowing to the inevitable and now support the disgusting orgy of government deficit-spending. Sure, we could have a currency so strong that it insures cheap imports of goods, services and raw materials, thus keeping inflation low and delivering a higher standard of living for all citizens..but thats crazy talk.

Besides..the fiat party is much more fun..

$12.8 trillion and counting

WOOOOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!

quote:

Indeed, as the debate bubbles up, some financiers are now even emailing each other an extraordinary little essay that Alan Greenspan himself wrote in support of a gold standard back in the 1960s, called “Gold and Economic Freedom”*.

ironic isn't it


*cough ahem Alan Greenspan: Gold and Economic Freedom

The old gold standard was flawed but it's not the only game in town. If we began to take the matter seriously I'm sure some smart people out there could come up with a variety of solutions. We could back the dollar with a diverse basket of commodities traded on the world market (oil, metals, natural gas, lumber, food, etc).. If you back currency with anything that requires energy and real productive capacity to pull out of the earth, you naturally limit the amount that can be created out of thin air.. It doesn't even need to be a 100% backing..just a partial backing would help a great deal in stabilizing it's value and allowing people to plan effectively for the future..rather than making foolish investments and chasing returns in an effort to outpace inflation.

Or we could forget any tangible backing and tackle the problem of deficit spending directly with a balanced budget amendment..forcing government to live within it's means rather than running $1.7 trillion deficits as they are this year.. The CBO has projected another $9 trillion in federal debt over the next decade..which will knock us to $20-21 trillion (an optimistic figure that assumes every penny of the trillions lent out so far are paid back to the fed/treasury). Things are a mess and something needs to change.

Whatever it is..a partial gold standard, balanced budget amendment, or anything else that can restrain the $20,000,000,000,000.00 monster is good in my book.

quote:

Originally posted by Capitalizt Sure, we could have a currency so strong that it insures cheap imports of goods, services and raw materials

i love how you always look at things in such a one-sided manner, as if a really strong currency doesn't come with downsides specifically what a strong currency does to exports, what importing cheap products does to businesses in america etc.

also, will you be willing to pay $9000 an ounce for gold?

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quote:

Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN i love how you always look at things in such a one-sided manner, as if a really strong currency doesn't come with downsides specifically what a strong currency does to exports, what importing cheap products does to businesses in america etc. also, will you be willing to pay $9000 an ounce for gold?

Why don't we compromise pk and instead of a "really strong currency", settle for a "slightly less weak" currency? And gold at $9k? The question you need to ask is WHY could gold be trading at $9k? What does that reflect? Everything is relative I suppose..and no I wouldn't buy gold at that level. There would be no need because the dollars are already "good as gold" aren't they? I assume the article is factoring in a 100% gold standard when they come up with those numbers. My question is, what if we just did a partial backing? How about a 10% gold standard? I've never heard it discussed..but if we just backed 10% of the dollars in circulation, the dollar would be worth 1/900th oz of gold ($900/oz)...right where it is today. Interesting..

Gold at 9000 $/oz is only a ten fold increase. That would be lots of inflation but no where near unheard of.

quote:

Originally posted by atbell Gold at 9000 $/oz is only a ten fold increase. That would be lots of inflation but no where near unheard of.

This really wouldn't be inflation though. It would just reflect the inflation that has already happened.

quote:

Originally posted by Capitalizt Or we could forget any tangible backing and tackle the problem of deficit spending directly with a balanced budget amendment..forcing government to live within it's means rather than running $1.7 trillion deficits as they are this year.. The CBO has projected another $9 trillion in federal debt over the next decade..which will knock us to $20-21 trillion (an optimistic figure that assumes every penny of the trillions lent out so far are paid back to the fed/treasury). Things are a mess and something needs to change.

We could start by withdrawing military presence in a few dozen of the 130 or 140 countries we're currently stationed in. I imagine that might save a $100 here or $200 there.