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April 25, 2020, 11:27:49 AM |
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It’s very unlikely that the golden standard will come back. The size and complexity of the U.S. economy would also make the conversion extremely difficult. Just to back the dollars now in circulation and on deposit—about $2.7 trillion—with the approximately 261 million ounces of gold held by the U.S. government, gold prices would have to rise as high as $10,000 an ounce, up from about $1,780, causing huge inflation. “It could do massive damage to the economy,” said John Makin, an economist at the American Enterprise Institute. So why the clamor for its return? Nostalgia, said economist Charles Wyplosz. “People long for a simpler age,” when the U.S. “was the dominant economy and there were no financial markets to speak of.” It’s like “getting back together with that old girlfriend,” said MarketWatch’s David Weidner. The current system may not be perfect, he says, but what people forget is that “the gold standard.
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