The True Gold Standard (Second Edition)
Rueff on Goethe's Faust Part II
The rascal offers wealth untold, But gives the glitter, not the gold. -- Goethe's Faust, Part II In his Speech in the Committee for Action and Economic Expansion, March 27, 1952, Jacques Rueff, the great monetary statesman, anticipated the recent speech by Bundesbank president Jens Weidmann by 60 years. Rueff: A German economist called Wageman, who was somewhat prominent under Hitler, said, in a book published during the war, that “the most important scientific work of the French in the monetary field was Zola’s great novel Money.”
Here and behold this leaflet rich in fate That turns our woes to prosperous estate: “To whom It may concern, this note of hand Is worth a thousand ducats on demand, The pledge whereof and guarantee is found In treasure buried in the Emperor’s ground.” None has the power to stay the flying chits, they run as quick as lightning on their way, And money-booths kept open night and day, When every single note is honored duly With gold and silver—though with discount truly. [an early example of monetary deprecation] From there it flows to wine-shops, butchers, bakers, with half the world as glutton merry-makers, The other bent on flaunting fashion-showing, The clothiers cutting-out, the tailors sewing . [full employment] “His Majesty!”—toasts flow and cellar clatters . . . But in his commentary on the festivities, the Herald foresees an unhappy outcome: Now see the charming mob all grabbing rush, They almost maul the donor in the crush. The gems he flicks around as in a dream, And snatchers fill the hall in greedy stream. But lo, a trick quite new to me: The thing each seizes eagerly Rewards him with a scurvy pay, The gift dissolves and floats away. The pearls are loosened from their band, And beetles scurry round his hand. And round his head they buzz about. With solid goods before their eyes, Some grab, and catch frail butterflies. The rascal offers wealth untold, But gives the glitter, not the gold.1
Nothing is missing: the technical formula, the political advantages, the social consequences. The poet was indubitably more clear-sighted than are most economists; he understood and clearly demon-started that inflation was the work of the devil be- cause it respected appearances but destroyed reality. Collected in The Age of Inflation, by Jacques Rueff, Henry Regnery Company, Chicago, 1954, pp. 62 - 64
America recently celebrated — well, maybe we didn’t celebrate – the 80th anniversary of Franklin Roosevelt’s action to end to the gold standard. But America is also celebrating – well, maybe not everyone is celebrating – the 100th anniversary of the legislation creating the Federal Reserve System.
As Lewis E. Lehrman...
Constitution.org provides an extensive and thoughtful Memorandum of Law by Larry Becraft, Esq., of Huntsville, Alabama, on Article I, Section 10, clause 1 of the US Constitution.
Sir William Blackstone courtesy of Wikipedia
One of many interesting matters the Memorandum treats is Blackstone's Commentaries, a book that was a fixture in the...
In the spring of 1933, global trade was being undermined by nationalistic economic responses to the Great Depression, including currency...
Economic theory began in the natural law philosophy with elements from Aristotle and Augustine, first integrated by Thomas...
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Kathleen M. Packard, Publisher The Gold Standard Now
Board of Advisors: Senior Advisors Sean Fieler, James Grant, Senior European Advisor Advisors In Memoriam
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George Gilder, whose new book publishes today, is one of the original pillars of Supply Side economics. As stated by Discovery Institute, which he co-founded, “Mr. Gilder pioneered the formulation of supply-side economics when he served as Chairman of the Lehrman Institute’s Economic Roundtable, as Program Director for the Manhattan Institute….”
Lately we have been engulfed by headlines reporting financial turmoil on every continent, in almost every nation, large and small. The commissars of central planning who so marred the history of the 20th century have been replaced by central banks in the 21st. In Cyprus, the new leadership now dares to confiscate citizens’ wealth with a one-time tax of up to 60 percent on bank deposits above 100,000 euros. Self-interested prime ministers blame continental monetary policies for instigating the currency wars that they themselves surreptitiously carry on.