A Quote by John Maynard Keynes

Gold is a relic from a time when government's were less trustworthy in these matters (currency debasement) than they are now.

John Maynard Keynes

Quote Topics

Currency Gold Government Less Matters Now Relic Than Time Trustworthy Were

Quote Author

John Maynard Keynes
English - Economist
June 5, 1883 - April 21, 1946

If one takes pleasure in calling the gold standard a "barbarous relic," one cannot object to the application of the same term to every historically determined institution. Then the fact that the British speak English - and not Danish, German, or French - is a barbarous relic too, and every Briton who opposes the substitution of Esperanto for English is no less dogmatic and orthodox than those who do not wax rapturous about the plans for a managed currency.

Ludwig von Mises

Many countries are looking at the virtual currency and the digital currency. Now, the issue is a virtual currency by the government, digital currency by the government that is one area to look but on the other hand, there are private cryptocurrencies as well.

Anurag Thakur

When you own gold you're fighting every central bank in the world. That's because gold is a currency that competes with government currencies and has a powerful influence on interest rates and the price of government bonds. And that's why central banks long have tried to suppress the price of gold. Gold is the ticket out of the central banking system, the escape from coercive central bank and government power.

James Rickards

When I was on tour, people would say "We don't need a value-based currency, we can go out and buy gold and silver with US dollars now." I mean that it is so utterly brain dead, because they miss the whole point: the reason we need to have a gold and silver based currency is to bring discipline to the financial system so the government can't go out and do all sorts of bad things.

Bernard von NotHaus

We were not foolish enough to try to make a currency [backed by] gold of which we had none, but for every mark that was issued we required the equivalent of a mark's worth of work done or goods produced ... we laugh at the time our national financiers held the view that the value of a currency is regulated by the gold and securities lying in the vaults of a state bank.

Adolf Hitler

Images are the currency of our age, but it's a toss-up whether live in a time of abundance or debasement.

Douglas McCulloh

To measure prices by a currency that is called by the same names as gold, but that is really inferior in value to gold, and then - because those prices are nominally higher than gold prices - to say that they are inflated, relatively to gold, is a perfect absurdity.

Lysander Spooner

With interest rates rising, gold doesn't pay an interest rate, but every other currency - it becomes not only less important to hold gold as an alternative, but more expensive to hold it as an insurance policy and so that will be a burden on the price of gold.

Lloyd Blankfein

Remember what we're looking at. Gold is a currency. It is still, by all evidence, a premier currency, that no fiat currency, including the dollar, can match.

Alan Greenspan

It is absurd to say that our country can issue $30,000,000 in bonds and not $30,000,000 in currency. Both are promises to pay; but one promise fattens the usurer (banker), and the other helps the people. If the currency issued by the Government were no good, then the bonds issued would be no good either. It is a terrible situation when the Government, to increase the national wealth, must go into debt and submit to ruinous interest charges at the hands of men who control the fictitious values of gold.

Thomas A. Edison

What there is no dispute about is whether or not China is a currency manipulator. They are a currency manipulator. They actively intervene every single day to keep the value of their currency less than it would be against the dollar than if it floated freely. We think. Even China barely disputes that.

Adam Davidson

Once upon a time, government budgets were balanced, our money was sound, the streets were safe, and taxes imposed by all levels of government took less than 10% of our income.

Harry Browne

In practice [monetary management] is merely a high-sounding euphemism for continuous currency debasement. It consists of constant lying in order to support constant swindling. Instead of automatic currencies based on gold, people are forced to take managed currencies based on guile. Instead of precious metals they hold paper promises whose value falls with every bureaucratic whim. And they are suavely assured that only hopelessly antiquated minds dream of returning to truth and honesty and solvency and gold.

Henry Hazlitt

The Debasement of World Currency:It Is Inflation, But Not As We Know It

Chris Powell

All issues - purchasing and selling of currency - are related to the regulation of the national currency market. However, it is still difficult to say what will be the reaction of the Central Bank and if it would lead to increasing the gold and foreign currency reserves.