The Dollar

[Henry C.K. Liu]

There were several reasons why Nixon went off the gold standard, the federal
deficit was only one.
When the Fed was first organized, the law provided that the gold reserve must be
at least enough to cover 40% of the currency in circulation and 35% of deposit
accounts. In 1931, FDR odered all banks to turn over their gold to Federal
Reserve Banks which turned it over to the Treasury, accepting gold certificates
in return. Thus banks could lend paper money according to Fed reserve
requirements, bypassing the required gold ratio.  In 1934, FDR, by permission of
Congress, devalued the dollar, reducing the gold content by 40%.
The real strain was the size of the global economy which had grown such that if
all the dollars were converted into gold at $35/onze, there were just not enough
gold to hold the price.  You remember, US citizen were forbidden by law to own
gold prior to 1971, talking about freedom!
As soon as the the dollar went off the gold standard, the price of gold went up
10 times eventually peaking around $550/onze.  The dollar went off its grossly
overvalued relation to gold and the euro dollars became devalued.
All the gold smugglers around the world went out of business.
The most important factor was again the Cold War. With Detent, the Soviet being
a major gold producer, Nixon was also throwing them a bone to enter into the
world trade system.
Of course, if you talk to a different person, you are likely to get a different
answer on the gold standard.

Henry

Daniel wrote:


> Henry wrote:
>
> "Seriously, no doubt the euro is going to be important, but unless the
> Europeans become more internationalist than they have been, the euro mya
> just go the route of the yen.  It will tie its value to the dollar instead
> of setting a separate currency standard. At the end of the day, all wealth
> will still be counted in dollars.  This is the reason why the US is arguing
> against the need for a new international financial architecture."
>
> Henry, I've been thinking about your point, and I realize that it highlights
> an aspect of this matter that I hadn't considered. But, still I wonder.
> Nixon was forced to decouple gold and the dollar because America had printed
> too many dollars for the war in Vietnam. (I mean, BASICALLY, that's what
> happened, n'est-ce pas?) Were there other currencies then that could rival
> the dollar? Yet, it happened. Why couldn't it happen again? If anything,
> there is a better alternative now than in 1971, isn't there? In fact,
> haven't there been some other pretty steep declines in the dollar, nearing
> panic, since then?
>
> Quincy