How would you go about reintroducing gold and silver backed currency in the USA?

In spite of your theory some people still use only cash. My wife and I bought a car with cash. The dealer's eyes got big as saucers when they started to discuss a loan and my wife reached into her huge purse and placed several big stacks of $100 bills on the desk and asked for a receipt. About 3 people counted the money separately to make sure it was enough, then they pulled out the IRS forms for cash transactions over $10,000, we signed them and left with a new car. It would be so much easier if I could have carried 3 dozen $1,000 bills in my pocket instead of 380 $100 bills. So don't talk to me about "nobody using big bills" or "not having change" that's BS. If more people used cash instead of credit they'd keep change or lose sales. And sorry, but I refuse to deal in credit and refuse to deal in electronic credits ... I don't even like to use checks.

 

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Actually President Kennedy tried to do just that by printing US Notes with a plan to eliminate Federal Reserve Notes and return us to a place where the US Treasury once again controlled the printing of currency ... some have theorized that that was the reason he was assassinated. Interesting theory but don't know if it was anything more than a theory.

 

It could be done in a similar manner to how monetary policy is accomplished today.

Simply pass legislation, have an Executive Order issued or introduce Fed policy that states a link between metal and fiat. That's it. It doesn't have to be true value or 100% backed, it simply needs a link. This could be done tomorrow and it might be something like stating each $1,000 in currency is backed by one ounce silver. You are not making the currency redeemable in metals and you are not fully backing it to its declared value; it is being fractionally backed.

 

So? You're describing "the exception" as not everybody, since we're talking about coins, cash, and currency that everybody would use, carries more than $500 without a specific reason of which, purchasing groceries or gasoline is not one of them.

 

Abraham Lincoln wanted the same thing. (i.e. Green Backs)

 

You can't. Get the gold, and silver masses. Back into the United States, so no other Sovereignty can lobby it back to us. Like the French did with Nixon. Which is impossible

 

I don't understand your comment. Abe didn't have the Federal Reserve to deal with.

 

As I recall, the late Gaddafi (spell?) of Libya was about to put his country (and eventually Egypt) on a gold standard. He was stopped. Kennedy wanted to eliminate the Treasury, and reorganize it, he was stopped. Certain powers want to keep certain things as is. We had to go off of the silver coinage. Sure at the time Johnson issued his decree, it seemed that we had enough silver for a time. Quarters, at .90 would equal about .18 oz per item. Multiply this by 20 billion (to cover a 10 year period). You would get about 360 million ounces. Add in dimes (want to consider half dollars, ASE, and dollars??) and the number is over 400,000,000 million ounces, roughly. It is possible!! But not if the dollars and ASE's were minted at .90 Ag. If they were added in we would certainly require over a billion ounces for 10 year period. So it would appear that we could utilize silver, from a materials perspective. However, unless Canada and Mexico also did likewise, these nations would hoard our silver. So, as mentioned earlier, from an international perspective, it is not possible. We would have to mint enough coins for many many nations which would grab all that we could mint, and then we would be bankrupt. Gold is out of the question if any circulation coinage is considered, (imagine a 20% gold nickel, for example).
GSDykes

 

Well here's my idea. Anything less then fire dollars face is like pennies and nickels prior to 1965. Backed by nothing. So here's my plan. You make a five dollar coin that is just smaller then a dime containing 1/20 of a Troy ounce of silver. Then a $10 coin with 1/10 an ounce of silver. $20 coin with 1/5 an ounce of silver. $50 coin with 1/2 an ounce of silver and a $100 coin with a full ounce of silver. Then on to the gold. A $250 coin with 1/10 and ounce of gold. $500 coin with 1/5 ounce of gold. A $1000 with 2/5 and ounce of gold. A $2000 with 4/5 ounce of gold. And a $2500 full ounce gold piece. Each has a note that is the same to former gold and silver certificates. Let me know how you feel about this.

 

Detroit Auto Manufacturing stopped not because of silver and gold prices

 

You can back US and World money with silver and gold and you don't need to issue silver or gold coins same paper money would be used

 

So what happens when something takes the price of silver above $100 an ounce, or the price of gold above $2500?

 

2 options. One reform the coinage. Two stop making gold and silver coins. I put it so high so it would take a long time before this would be a problem.

 

Good discussion. Lots of good ideas.

 

No but the government didn't issue the nations paper currency then either. It was issued by the state banks, private banks, and even some corporations. Lincoln wanted to get it under government control so they formed the BEP (went by a different name then) and imposed a 10% tax on all the state and private paper money.

 

It wasn't named the Federal Reserve back then but....yes, he did have it to deal with. They were called National Banks.

 

National Bank Act, 1913 Federal Reserve Act was passed

On 23rd December 1913 the house of representatives had past the Federal Reserve Act, but it was still having difficulty getting it out of the senate. Most members of congress had gone home for the holidays, but unfortunately the senate had not adjourned sene die (without day) so they were technically still in session. There were only three members still present. On a unanimous consent voice vote the 1913 Federal Reserve Act was passed. No objection was made, possibly because there was no one there to object.

 

This could be done as a novelty and used as a way to appease the gold/silver bugs, but way too much hassle to do on a large scale. The market is extremely volatile affected by a global market. Not just what's going on here. Gold could hit $2500 next year. Then by the time they got around to adjusting the values and changing everything it could plunge to $1k.

Gold and silver were hoarded going back to the Civil war. It'd be a complex thing to do now, and it's not going to happen with this country in it's current form.
- The govt doesn't want the hassle or new expense.
- They hate any way for drug dealers to launder large amounts of money. - The population has become far too large. (Back in the day when they made gold for circulation, most people who lived through those times never saw a single example in person their entire lives. Much less used them for commerce.)

- Most of the population would be too confused to understand the change.
- It's cheaper to make stacks of bills and assign them a value

If you make the coinage with such a small fraction of actual PM compared to face, there's no point. If you try to make them worth the PM value, the market is too volatile for them to circulate in time. Neither option works or makes sense. A one ounce silver coin worth $500 is a counterfeiter's dream. God knows we don't need them to have another way of debasing what we have.
Besides that, even in the hay day of silver dollars when they were making millions every year for use, they didn't circulate well, if at all. They sat in mint bags and eventually hundreds of millions were melted.

I think if they had the technology, knowledge and capability to make coinage the way we do today, they probably would have started doing it 200 years ago. What has happened was inevitable and it just took time to evolve. Clad dimes, quarters and nickels serve their purpose as intended and nobody hoards them for their value. There's no shortage. Not worth the trouble of counterfeiting.

This isn't to say that silver and gold aren't recognized on the side as being a more desirable store of real wealth. It just doesn't have a place in daily commerce and hasn't for longer than most realize.

Frankly, I'm surprised things are still the way they are today.
If the powers that be could snap their fingers and have every penny of every transaction tracked electronically, they'd do it tomorrow. Some day there'll be a push to go there. Every govt entity is desperate for revenue and they know they're missing out on a lot out there. They're not anxious to find new ways for people to trade for goods and services under the radar. They're looking to eliminate ways to do this.
In spite of this, not all is lost. As we still have some freedoms left to do as we wish with what exists. I know of a podcast that the host will accept silver as payment for membership. Other people do too. Collectors trade bullion for coins and coins for bullion all the time. Nobody forces you to take cash or electronic payment. I'm satisfied with that. The option is still there for people to do whatever they want, but as far as making it standardized, I don't think there's a way or a valid reason to do it.

The monetary system has evolved into something that is full of it's own problems that PMs can't solve. We have a system that is functional for no other reason but that it HAS to be for 300+ million people to survive. Most of my monthly bill transactions take place in cyberspace now. Nothing physical comes in or goes out. Not even a check to deposit. Just numbers changing in the computer.

 

Well I simply can't live in a world where this is the reality. That's why tonight (or this morning) I am officially announcing that I will be running for The House Of Repersentives in 2024.

 

Based on this issue alone? How old are you? Maybe you should read through my post again in a fully awake and coherent state? Lol.
Ron Paul is there and has been a champion for your cause for years. It never gains traction. I used to think like you do but as I've gotten older I've become more neutral on this.
In some ways its shocking the way the current system works but yet not so shocking when you think about what our day to day needs are.
They could say today that theres a mountain of gold backing the dollars in your pocket. But you and nobody else can view it. So it may or may not exist. Day to day transactions for cash would continue because they have to.

I guess I'm wondering what is the root cause or reasoning behind your desire for them to make this change? The inherent problems have all been laid out here.

How would anyone benefit or anything change by doing this? Any PM produced here that left our borders would never come back. Which would lead to constant shortages and the old stuff, what we have now, would continue to circulate. If you got this changed, you can't force other countries to follow suit.