What would happen if you owned a jewelry store? Or if you had gold teeth? I am not too familiar with this aside from some quick reading on this website and some others.
Were you able to hold any gold if you were a citizen? Why can we own gold now?
What if you were a miner?
What was the reasoning (explained not theorized by conspiracy theories) given on why this was happening, and was it reasonable?
Who had it confiscated from them that was an American? And was it a purchase of the gold the people owned or was it taken?
Could the lack of american demand be a reason why the price didn't move? How do you know it didn't move?
It seems to have moved in price according to this:
I just don't buy that something that has little real value to society has to be the only thing worth anything.
And if you please, could you also answer my question here:
I am actually very interested in how you get to gold being the only measurement of value.
Ill do my best here han to answer your questions.
First of all we need to determine what makes an item useful as money. For things to be used as money they need to have certain characteristics.
Durability-Any commodity that is to serve well as money should possess durability to a high degree. Otherwise it would wear quickly in its passage from hand to hand, and even deteriorate while in the possession of its owner. Consequently, perishable goods such as cattle, furs, tobacco, and even wheat and corn, have never proved satisfactory as mediums of exchange.
Portability-The commodity that serves as money must be moved from point to point, among the members of the society that uses it. Otherwise it is not money. This movement involves labor
http://chestofbooks.com/finance/economics/Elementary-Economics/75-Foreign-Immigration-Immigration-And-Labor.html and expense. Hence, the commodity that combines greatest value in the smallest bulk, if we consider portability alone, is the most desirable as a medium of exchange.
Homogeneity- that is, the commodity from which it is made must be of the same quality wherever it is found. Obviously, cattle possess this characteristic to a very low degree, for scarcely any two of them are alike.
Divisibility- Is closely related to homogeneity, simply means the capability of a commodity to be divided without destroying its value. Here again, cattle do not possess this characteristic. Neither do furs or diamonds. Either loses value by being divided. The total value of the parts of a split diamond never equals the value of the original stone.
Of all the commodities known to mankind gold possesses in the highest degree the characteristics of good money
http://chestofbooks.com/finance/economics/Elementary-Economics/Characteristics-Of-Gold.html#. Since the earliest time it has been desired for its own use as a commodity. Primitive man prized gold above all other metals. From it he made rings, chains, and other ornaments that appealed to his vanity. His descendants regard gold in much the same way. Gold is also scarce enough to make it highly valuable compared to its bulk, and yet it exists in large enough quantities to permit of its use in making exchanges
http://chestofbooks.com/finance/economics/Elementary-Economics/Exchange.html. Finally, the value of gold is stable, though we must not get the mistaken idea, which some have, that it does not vary. The reason for its stability is that the supply of the metal coming from the mines, in any year let us say, is extremely small compared with the total supply in the possession of society.
Gold possesses also to a high degree the physical characteristics of a good money It is made durable by combining with the fine metal a small part of alloy. Gold wears well in coins, though it is best preserved by molding it in the form of bars. Also since it combines a relatively high value with small bulk, gold may be easily carried about. The homogeneity of gold is well known to every student of chemistry, who learns early in his course that it is a chemical element. All fine gold, therefore, is exactly alike, whether it be mined in South Africa or in Alaska. Gold is also divisible. No change in its shape or form affects its value. Two one-ounce pieces of gold are worth exactly as much as one two-ounce piece. Melting, rolling, or pounding has no effect whatever on the value of fine gold. Fifth, gold is the most difficult of all the metals to counterfeit. Any one accustomed to handle gold money can detect a spurious Gold Coin at a glance.
From the foregoing discussion of the qualities of a good money we can easily see why society has, by a long process of selection chosen gold as a standard. It could not have done otherwise. Whether or not gold will continue down to the end of time as the money standard, no one can say. I am reasonably sure that commodity will come only when that commodity shows its superiority to gold.
Acting under the authority of the Emergency Banking Relief Act, President Roosevelt issued Executive Order No. 6073. In addition to authorizing the Secretary of the Treasury to decide which of the nations' banks could open, the Order prohibited owners of gold from exporting or otherwise removing it from the United States. Shortly thereafter, also under the authority of the Emergency Banking Act, the President issued Executive Order No. 6102, which provided that all privately owned gold in the United States was to be confiscated by the government. As compensation, the owners would receive paper money.
in 1933, Franklin Delano Roosevelt dealt with a monetary and banking crisis by confiscating all privately owned gold; paying for the gold at $20.67 per ounce; immediately devaluing the dollar by 40 percent; and setting the price of gold at $35.00 per ounce. At a single stroke, Roosevelt increased the government's gold assets, stabilized the monetary system and increased wholesale prices by more than 33 percent. However, he also inflicted losses of 40 percent on gold owners and stripped them of the gold that they saved to insure their financial futures.
There were certain Caveats,
The President's gold confiscation order specifically exempted
"gold coins having a recognized special value to collectors of rare and unusual coins." The reason for the exception had nothing to do with sympathy for owners of numismatic gold coins, but rather with the provisions of the Constitution's Eminent Domain Clause. Twelve words provide the protective barrier: "nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation." Since the confiscation of rare coins would be a taking of private property, just compensation would have to be paid.
When gold bullion was confiscated, the government had no difficulty asserting that payment in paper currency at the official gold price was just compensation. What had occurred was arguably a mere exchange of component parts of the monetary system, i.e. bullion for currency. But just compensation for rare gold coins manifestly not part of the monetary system would have been a very different situation.
The government would have been forced to determine compensation on a coin-by-coin basis, an impossible administrative and logistical burden.
Order 6102 specifically exempted "customary use in industry, profession or art"--a provision that covered artists, jewelers, dentists, and sign makers among others. The order further permitted any person to own up to $100 in gold coins. So if you had 1000 double eagles, when the government was done with you , they let you keep 5 of those coins.
Now you may have figured out that only US citizens could not own gold, but Foreigners could still exchange each dollar for an equivalent amount of gold, and that is just what they did. Over the next 40 years various programs were used to stop the gold from leaving the country. With foreign governments exchanging their dollars for our gold if something wasn't done, there would be no gold left in the government coffers in which to back the currency. By the 1960's the gold reserves could no longer back each dollar but fractionally, President Eisenhower and Kennedy passed orders making it more difficult to get the gold out of the country, but France all of a sudden wanted to trade their 200 million dollars in for gold, if that had happened there would be almost no gold left in the USA. Nixon refused and closed the exchange forever. Since that day on the US dollar had only fiat value, its intrinsic value is near nothing.
Why did the price of gold stay the same price? because the government controlled the price and they only revalued it a few more times. By the time it was all said and done gold was worth $42 per ounce and the US still uses that price to value the gold in reserves. Since the price of gold was kept the same, all other items would now vary in price in relation to gold. Thats why your chart of housing shows a non linear price. The value of the homes was increasing or decreasing in relation to the fixed value of gold. It is still that way. think of the US dollar on one side of a teeter totter and gold being on the other side. It is a perfect correlation. When you see the USDX (Us Dollar index) go down, you will see a exact reverse correlation in the price of gold.
Now you explained that Alan Greenspan had alot to do with the economic downturn, and I agree.,but Greenspan also knew of the power of gold.
He gave a speech which i will Quote some and leave you a link for the rest.
"
[SIZE=-1]In the absence of the gold standard, there is no way to [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]protect savings from confiscation through inflation[/SIZE][SIZE=-1]. There is no safe store of value. If there were, the government would have to make its holding illegal, as was done in the case of gold. If everyone decided, for example, to convert all his bank deposits to silver or copper or any other good, and thereafter declined to accept checks as payment for goods, bank deposits would lose their purchasing power and government-created bank credit would be worthless as a claim on goods. [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]The financial policy of the welfare state requires that there be no way for the owners of wealth to protect themselves."[/SIZE]
http://www.usagold.com/gildedopinion/greenspan.html
How do you suppose Greenspan came to this conclusion?
When 1 foreign central bank pays another central bank what do they pay in? They don't use currencies they use GOLD. For the last century the Politicians and governments of this world have deceived all of us and made us believe that these pieces of paper really had value, but it is an ever decreasing value. They keep the gold and give us the paper, they know that paper aint worth shit, but gold is the standard by which EVERYTHING is priced against. of course they don't tell you that, they don't want you to know the secret.
How can you explain that a hershey bar in 1950 cost 5 cents, but now it costs $1. Did the candy bar become harder and harder to manufacture over the years? No, it has become a much much more efficient process. Did cocoa harvest decrease year after year? No they have increased every year. Did the sugar industry and the milk industry become much less efficient over the last 100 years? certainly not. So how is it that a candy bar has increased in price by 2000%? You don't see the price of a computer go up each year, they keep finding new ways to make them cheaper to produce, just Like the Hershey Company has found ways to make their candy bars cheaper to manufacture. So why the increase in price? Its simple really, the price hasn't increased, your dollar has lost value and it just takes more of them to purchase the same things...Inflation
Hopefully you get the idea.
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