The story of money

[Cuddlefish]

Non-malicious bump.

Just to show not everything pre-coup was retarded.

I found this an interesting read, but the story being hosted on a gold investment site makes me a little... cautious as to how much salt it should be taken with. I would appreciate a little instruction, my economic knowledge is limited to common sense and intuition (at times, that is enough to serve my purposes, however, the limitations are obvious), and a little "formal" education on the matter would be cool.

[hirley0]

v read down v Maybe its right? maybe its wrong ?/?

http://www.gold-eagle.com/editorials_99/hannigan092099.html

This is a fantastic read. Simple enough for even children (though not too young) to understand, and thought-provoking.

2 KAN if U Likei Kan remove this post
if it is still here Friday the bet is off /-/owever | namu.free.fr
is that really U a real FrenchMan ?/?
===========
Anyway IC the frenchman has not logged in in years so my guess is this remains
capitol R {sorry| (forward} my guess is come May ? WiLL move  the 3 here from
financial? Just a few days from now /-/A:
December 26, 2004, tsunami  over US$7 billion Mar 11, 2011  tsunami ($309bn)


currently somewhere between 120,000 and 140,000 tonnes of gold 'above ground
1 Tonnes (metric ton) into Grams Result: 1,000,000 = 130,000,000,000 130Billion g
?\8B = .6¢/g = about 20¢/oz | ?\333B bout $2.5/g $75/oz
bout 23 grams per person, bout $250 - $350 worth per person 

ANYWAY this is not making much ¢ents at this time
(Read 4575 times) ? 3  CHICCHAN p64 & the 3 of them YES: i'LL Try2 Watch M

[Cain]

Non-malicious bump.

Just to show not everything pre-coup was retarded.

I found this an interesting read, but the story being hosted on a gold investment site makes me a little... cautious as to how much salt it should be taken with. I would appreciate a little instruction, my economic knowledge is limited to common sense and intuition (at times, that is enough to serve my purposes, however, the limitations are obvious), and a little "formal" education on the matter would be cool.

Yeah, it's some pretty ham-fisted propaganda on behalf of goldbugs, it must be said. 

The ensuing conversation on here was pretty good though.

[Cuddlefish]

Non-malicious bump.

Just to show not everything pre-coup was retarded.

I found this an interesting read, but the story being hosted on a gold investment site makes me a little... cautious as to how much salt it should be taken with. I would appreciate a little instruction, my economic knowledge is limited to common sense and intuition (at times, that is enough to serve my purposes, however, the limitations are obvious), and a little "formal" education on the matter would be cool.

Yeah, it's some pretty ham-fisted propaganda on behalf of goldbugs, it must be said. 

The ensuing conversation on here was pretty good though.

I can see "ham-fisted." Buuuut, "all things are partially true, partially false, and partially meaningless." Is there any truth to this ham-fisted manifesto?

[hirley0]

am-fisted propaganda

? 7 ?  THUS: on tv i did see the aganda about 1k/g
as the Maid for TV price quote for the Ca Meteroite bits

i pose now i need to ercalculate the old 9e9 value of the Oregon
meteroRITE in NY BUUT later gotta go to the bank | IF i get UP: 10:26 /-/

[Prelate Diogenes Shandor]

WHAT we need to do is simple, but HOW to do it I have absolutely no idea...

Someone, somewhere, somehow, has to initiate runs on the following banks:

    Bank of America
    Bank of China
    Bank of New York Mellon
    Banque Populaire CE
    Barclays
    BNP Paribas
    Citigroup
    Commerzbank
    Credit Suisse
    Deutsche Bank
    Dexia
    Goldman Sachs
    Crédit Agricole
    HSBC
    ING Bank
    JP Morgan Chase
    Lloyds Banking Group
    Mitsubishi UFJ FG
    Mizuho FG
    Morgan Stanley
    Nordea
    Royal Bank of Scotland
    Santander
    Société Générale
    State Street
    Sumitomo Mitsui
    UBS
    Unicredit Group
    Wells Fargo


See also :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systemically_important_financial_institution#List_of_banks
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Too_big_to_fail#Financial_Stability_Board_list

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Can't run on banks which make most of their profits from lending and investment.

[hirley0]

Why not? { 'cause they R heavy: 6:40?xx

HOW to do it I have absolutely no idea...

iT is reasonably easy NEXT time you
are in a bank simply ASK for what they do not have

USually they do not have US 1/2 dollar coins aka 50¢ pieces
also low numbers of $2. bills, Always buy all the have
IF they have | that is the main rule | if they have buy them all.!.

[ñͤͣ̄ͦ̌̑͗͊͛͂͗ ̸̨̨̣̺̼̣̜͙͈͕̮̊̈́̈͂͛̽͊ͭ̓͆ͅé ̰̓̓́ͯ́́͞]

Can't run on banks which make most of their profits from lending and investment.

Why not?

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Can't run on banks which make most of their profits from lending and investment.

Why not?

... because how the hell do you withdraw your mortgage from the bank? Or convince other corporations to pull out their employees 401k investments?

[wlfjstr]

The Golden Eagle has landed

Really, this sounds plausible to you?  It may show some things about the way people view money and other ways to view it than you are accustomed. But the story at it's base doesn't seem like a very accurate metaphor for how money was created.

The whole point of money is that it is an abstraction. Barter is inefficient for any large scale trading, so people created an abstract method to barter in bulk.  Gold was a good choice for this at the time because it was not easy for most people to amass or forge (both methods to keep people from just making more).  It has no intrinsic value other than what we have given it (for instance sometimes shells, that you can pick up on the beach, were used).

Eventually our ability to trade efficiently outstripped our ability to move gold around, so we made it out of paper, representing the gold.  And after that the inherently finite nature of gold caused problems when the amount of goods and services made the gold so expensive that only very rich men could have 'real' money.  So we broke the last physical barrier to free trade and made the money completely abstract.

Is this a bad thing? a good thing?  I'm sure both of those are true, according to the viewpoint from which you wish to take.

The original article oversimplifies the 'story' of money and exhibits a strong bias in my opinion.  First, they pronounce the only thing gov't was for, "In each community a simple Government had been formed to make sure that each person's freedoms and rights were protected and that no man was forced to do anything against his will by any other man, or any group of men. This was the Government's one and only purpose and each Governor was voluntarily supported by the local community who elected him."

I can't think of a single gov't, until the past two or three hundred years that was anything close to that.  Although our gov't is similar in scope, whether it has ever delivered on it is debatable, or at least has been debated ad nauseum.  Traditionally governments throughout history have tried to keep control of the money supply.  Partly to be able to control economy when beneficial and always as a way to maintain control of the society they represent.  Remember the story of Jesus and the moneylenders?  Judaism required that money for sacrifice to jehovah be in Israeli coin, but the romans outlawed the use of foreign currency.  The Jewish moneylenders then made money in the conversion.  How does this fit the original article?  Was it a conspiracy of the bankers?  Or an expected outcome of competing currencies in a volatile environment?

After dispensing quickly with how the 'money' system was developed, the article moves on to describe the nature of current economic woes.  It is interesting that the idea of taxing is brought up as having been designed to solve social ills in response to the problems of money.  I'm not completely sure, but the concepts of taxes and tribute weren't created exactly that way in the history I've read.

In conclusion, the original article, is a piece of propaganda that is dressed up like an allegorical story.