Submitted by James E. Miller of the Ludwig von Mises Institute of Canada,
With a price hovering around $1,600 an ounce and the prospect of “additional monetary accommodation” hinted to in the latest meeting of the Federal Reserve’s Federal Open Market Committee, gold is once again becoming a hot topic of discussion.
George Soros made news recently when a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission revealed that he had liquidated his position with major financial firms and had loaded up on gold; approximately 884,000 shares worth. Jim Cramer, the CNBC personality in constant search of growing business trends,recommends putting at least 20% of one’s assets in gold. Following the Republican National Convention, the party platform now proposes the establishment of a commission to study “the feasibility of a metallic basis for U.S. currency.”
Like the gold commission before it, this new interest in gold has brought out the critics who regard the precious metal as nothing short of, to borrow the infamous term coined by John M. Keynes, a “barbarous relic.” Wesleyan University economist Richard Grossman writes in the Los Angeles Times that the idea of a gold commission is a “waste of time and money” because the standard hasn’t “worked for 100 years.” InThe Atlantic, fiat currency enthusiast Matthew O’Brien calls the gold standard a “terrible idea” and presents a few charts demonstrating that linking the dollar to gold failed to keep prices stable. Economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman has praised O’Brien’s article on his blog and makes sure to point out that the price of gold has been highly volatile since 1968 by showing the following chart:
There is a remarkably widespread view that at least gold has had stable purchasing power. But nothing could be further from the truth.
