Gold is fiat money too

Fiat money is money declared by a government to be legal tender.

The legal tender laws give the Federal Reserve its monopoly on money.

Ron Paul:
One of the main stumbling blocks is Federal legal tender laws, which state that government-controlled fiat currency MUST be accepted for many kinds of monetary transactions.

(This is simple, but I don't know that I've seen it phrased succinctly and maybe it is not enough appreciated.)

Honest money should be nothing more than a medium for storing and exchanging labor.

We don't have honest money largely because it is to the advantage of others to take our labor through the use of force and with malicious intent.

We all need to be thinking of how to create/implement honest money (i.e., a medium, or mediums, for storing and exchanging our labor) in a practical way.

http://www.youtube.com/wa...

In regards to the utility value of gold, your comments do make sense. Starving people would not be interested in eating bits of gold, etc, etc.

However, gold is not simply the same as fiat money. Gold prevents the gov from creating money out of thin air, thereby keeping the government in check (not able to just make more gold to fund all the failing programs).

With fiat currencies governments are able to tax, borrow & print money in order to fund operations. With gold, or a gold standard, governments lose the option of printing.

Borrowing would be much less of a viable option as well, because while countries such as China do not mind buying our debt (lending us money) using their own fiat currency, they surely would think twice about sending boatloads of their precious metals over here in order to lend us money.

That leaves the last options, taxation. So... which politicians would stand a chance of getting re-elected if they had to increase taxes to 60-70% in order to fund all their failing programs, illegal wars & bailouts of companies? They would either be voted out of office or chased out.

Gold keeps governments honest. It's honest money. Fiat is certainly not the same as gold.

Honest money should be the term used. There's nothing wrong with paper dollars. The problem is in counterfeiting paper dollars. We give the FED the authority to counterfeit, we (when I say we I don't mean the folks on DP but the nation as a whole) don't quite understand that's what they are doing.

But that is what they do, plain and simple fraud. The FED would have a much tougher go of it if they had to counterfeit gold.

What does "fiat" really mean. The gold supply is increased every year by about 3% in inflationary terms. They keep digging for it and finding it. However, paper dollars can increase 100% or more a year. No digging necessary, just turn on the presses.

So, gold does adjust, but you can't compare it to paper dollars. That comparison just isn't true.

GOLD IS THE ULTIMATE EXTINGUISHER OF DEBT NO COUNTER PARTY RISK. THE BOND MARKET WOULD NOT FUNCTION IF THE BOND HOLDERS FOR A SECOND COULD NOT HEDGE THERE RISK IN THE GOLD MARKET THEY UNDERSTAND A BOND IS NOTHING BUT A PROMISE TO PAY WITH ANOTHER BOND OR FIAT. THEY WANT TO KNOW AT ALL TIMES THEY CAN CASH THAT BOND IN FOR GOLD LIKE I IMAGINE MANY ARE DOING TODAY.

WHEN PEOPLE LOSE FAITH IN FAKE COUNTERFIT PAPER THE CAPITOL GETS HOARDED WETHER YOU LIKE IT OR NOT GOLD GOES UNDER THE MATTRESS NEVER TO COME OUT AND CAPITOL BECOMES NONE EXISTENT AS WE ARE SEEING NOW. ITS HARD AS HELL TO GET A LOAN OR ANY OTHER MONEY.

I DONT NEED TO GIVE YOU A HISTORY LESSON GOLD MAY HAVE BEEN DEMONITIZED BUT HAS NEVER BEEN TAMED AS MANKIND HAS A LOVE AFFAIR WITH THE PRECIOUS METAL. ITS UNIVERSALLY ACCEPTED ALL OVER THE PLANET I CANT SAY THE SAME FOR FIAT AS IM SURE YOU WOULDNT ACCEPT A TURKISH LIRA AS PAYMENT FOR YOUR SERVICE AS A DISH WASHER AND SOON YOU WILL SEE HOW FAST FOREIGNERS WONT ACCEPT THAT GARBAGE CALLED US FEDERAL RESERVE CRAP.

WITH IDIOTS LIKE YOU AS CITIZEN IS WHY I HAVE BEEN TELLING MY CLIENTS TO BUY GOLD SILVER AND OIL SINCE 2002 AS I HAVE ALWAYS HAD A GOOD IDEA OF THE IQ LEVEL OF THE AVERAGE JOE.

THIS PERSON IS AN IDIOT. GOLD IS NOT FIAT THERE IS NO COUNTER PARTY IT IS THE ONLY MONEY THAT MAN HAS EVER HAD THAT CAN EXTINGUISH DEBT AS FIAT CANT EXTINGUISH DEBT SINCE IT IS DEBT IN AN OF ITSELF, WHAT A FUKING MORON AND WHY THIS COUNTRY IS HEADED DOWN THE TUBES.

The definition of "fiat money" means a currency that government compels people to accept. Nobody was ever forced to accept gold as payment.

-jcr

Your point of view doesn't change the fact that gold has value in our world and fiat currencies are the dumbest thing mankind has ever though of, well maybe reality shows but it's a close race.
The value of energy is also a perception isn't it? I mean if we start to compare the value of everything in fiat dollars as you have.
Gold is an element, this is a well established fact. I cannot make gold by decree.

"Fiat" means that someone *forcibly* made you do something, as in legal tender laws. Gold isn't fiat money, unless it's mandated by the government as legal tender.

Yes yes yes. We all know how the value of gold is arrived at. Its the same damn way anything is valued. But for cripes sake can we quit arguing about that? When you start your argument against gold trying to tell people how its valued you look like a fool because you aren't telling anybody anything new. Baseball cards, houses, paper money, diamonds...yep all "perceived value". Any voluntary exchange works this way & some one value's an iphone more than the 200 dollars it costs to get one, but is an iphone going to add honestly 200 dollars more to your life for 2 years? Does it really cost steve jobs more than 50 bucks to have the Asians put it together for him?

I don't doubt that oil may go through the roof along with gold. But there is nothing that says we can't go back to chariots like the Romans used. If the price gets too high the market will adjust to minimize the impact of it by decreasing the demand for it. You can't possibly think someone can grow enough food to feed themselves and their family in a garden do you? there is a division of labor out there for a reason. I got nothing against gardening, but i know I will always be able to get more from my ounce of gold than from my dozen ears of sweet corn...my time is worth more to me than your time is worth to you.

Actually energy is the true basic currency. We all consume it and we all produce it. We use our energy to produce things and we consume things that required energy to produce. How do we capture it as a currency?

If you think it is then you don't understand what the term 'fiat currency' means.

Fiat currency is money just because someone says its money. It is used, not because it has any intrinsic worth, but because it is backed by force of government.

Money is just a place holder; a convenient medium to barter with. You can use anything for money, gold, oil, bread: Any commodity will do provided it is liquid (people are willing to trade for it).

Money tends to have a few other attributes that cause it to be liquid:
1. It is fungible. (One unit of the money is identical to another unit)
2. It can easily be divided up into smaller units.
3. It has high value per unit of weight.
4. It's supply isn't highly variable.

Gold is fungible, its divisible, it has relatively high value per unit of weight, etc. That's why it was used as money for so long. It's not fiat currency.

any money chosen by the market is not fiat in nature

um, you need something to buy this energy with. thats where gold comes in. youre totally missing the point. your position in gold will dictate how much energy; no matter what form; you can buy. what dont you get??

haha, man. there has been ridiculousness posted all over the dp lately. are we all getting tired of hearing the truth or what? so tired, we need to believe in something other than the truth?

fiat money is "legal tender" government money. gold is clearly not.

also, gold is used for several purposes. it's not just a popular "shiny metal". gold may not be cars or houses itself, but if you had a house or car made out of gold, your house or car would clearly be worth a hell of a lot more than a paper house. that may not be your argument. but you used part of the keynesian argument as your position in calling gold itself a fiat currency....which it clearly isn't.

Dood doesn't even know what "fiat" money means.

Fiat money is money that has value DECLARED BY GOVERNMENT EDICT! Gold isn't fiat money. It is commodity money. The exchange value of gold is set by the market, not by edict.

Do some reading. Educate yourself. Then maybe you will have something worth saying.

edit: I guess this is an old post. Nevermind. :-)

I'm not going to bother. Normally, I'd launch into a tirade. Water doesn't store very well without upkeep and it's a pain in the ass to haul around. All food is perishable. Have you got anything else to trade with? Fool.

Res ipsa loquitur. What a maroon!

NOTHING besides oxygen and water has "intrinsic value". In that sense you are right. As far as value derived from use, however, Gold is used for jewelry, as a semiconductor, and its limited supply provides an optimal choice as money.

When the SHTF, the only things that will be worth anything are clean food, clean water, shelter, heat and the means to acquire and/or produce these needs. An animal in the wild could care less about a shiny metal that tastes like crap. If you are still planning on living a "Western" lifestyle and there are others who feel the same way, you can trade metals for goods or services at whatever exchange rate you see fit, as long as everyone agrees on what that exchange rate is while trying to avoid inflation.

required to mine it, bringing it up out of the earth, refining and purifying it, and finally minting the finished product.

Remember the golden rule: Whoever has it, rules!

The value of gold is measured in how much there is in the world and how much work it takes to "produce". You have to work hard to get it, I can grow a tree n my back yard and write 1 with hounder zeros on it.
Of course it is supply and demand also.

lol ... need I say anymore?

A prudent man foresees the difficulties ahead and prepares for them; the simpleton goes blindly on and suffers the consequences. Proverbs 22:3

If we enacted Ron Paul's recommendation, Gold would not be fiat money. He was just recommending that people be allowed to use gold in competition with Government-issued dollars.

I agree with this theory sir. Gold is just another commodity. Whenever the government attempts to gain control of any commodity then it can be corrupt. Fiat paper currencies are just god damn pieces of paper with a value printed on it. They have no actual value themselves. Gold by itself does not have any value either. The value comes from where we humans place a value on it. The value comes from how we use the gold ie computer microchips. Ask a lion or tiger to try to survive on gold. They cannot. We humans cannot survive off of just gold. In my opinion food, water, and clean air are far more valuable. If we were all to learn to grow our own food, obtain water directly from the atmosphere and not the sodium fluoridated public water supply, and energy from sources besides the energy grid our governments practically force us to use, then perhaps we wouldn't have to worry about whether or not gold has any value or not.

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That may be true, but I still have an outrageous water bill every month and there is plenty of rain where I live. Price or perceived valued can also be controlled by governments who set up monopoly providers.
grant