Volume 8, No. 4 (Winter 2005) During the late nineteenth century, when silver agitation threatened the gold standard in the United States, gold bonds offered investors some protection from the uncertainties concerning the monetary standard in the United States. Gold bonds, therefore, sold at a premium relative to similar currency bonds. This
The Free Market 19, no. 1 (January 2001) According to the dictionary, the word “wanton” means undisciplined or unruly, with connotations of self-indulgent, arrogant recklessness, and a disregard for justice or the rights of others. The word goes back to Middle English, being a combination of the words “wanting” or “wane,” meaning a lack of, and
Ludwig von Mises was the foremost advocate of the gold standard of his day. Yet, he recognized that gold only became the world’s premier monetary metal because of a botched attempt to establish a bimetallic standard, in which the government tried to fix the value of gold in terms of silver ( Human Action, 3rd revised edition, p. 471 ). Well,
With all the recent news about con men operating phony businesses, I was struck by a curious item I came across on eBay. It was a $3 bill from the Salem & Philadelphia Manufacturing Company of New Jersey, dated 1828. It wasn’t the $3 amount of the note that caught my attention, as notes from that period came in many amounts that have long since
There’s a movement afoot to place a portrait of our nation’s fortieth President, Ronald Reagan, onto one of the denominations of our currency. The last two changes, putting first Susan B. Anthony’s countenance, and then Sacagawea’s on the $1 coin, proved to be failures. The prior two changes, putting President John F. Kennedy’s face on the 50¢
At my supermarket, there’s a machine that says “convert your coins into money,” for which service it charges “only” 3 percent. Aren’t coins already money? And, why should it cost money to convert one form of money into another form? As to whether coins are or are not money, perhaps it depends on their legal tender status. That is, how many coins
In 1840, the state of Mississippi defaulted on interest payments on $2 million of Planters Bank bonds and $5 million of Mississippi Union Bank bonds. About the same time, seven other states and one territory (later granted statehood) defaulted on their debts, as did the Republic of Texas (later annexed as a state). Most states later reconciled
What is the Mises Institute?
The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard.
Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order. We believe that our foundational ideas are of permanent value, and oppose all efforts at compromise, sellout, and amalgamation of these ideas with fashionable political, cultural, and social doctrines inimical to their spirit.