This as China and other countries continue to dump US Treasury debt at record levels.

  • GreatSquare@lemmygrad.ml
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    17
    ·
    17 days ago

    I see a couple of comments here about a world gold backed standard being the secret motivation behind China’s gold stacking.

    The world used to use the gold standard and it was actually not that great for a few reasons e.g. :

    • A country’s money supply would be limited by how much gold can be produced. That can cause a lot of grief if a government has to pay a lot of wages or welfare in an emergency for some reason like a natural disaster.

    • Massive fluctuations in the exchange rate can happen in the short term even if the average rate over the long term is relatively stable. This can hurt poorer people more than richer people who can ride it out.

    Unless China or BRICS or whoever comes up with some tweaks to the system to mitigate potential gotchas, it would be a step backwards.

    • Munrock ☭@lemmygrad.ml
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      11
      ·
      17 days ago

      I don’t think either of those issues impact a command economy anywhere near as much as they do a laissez-faire system. Both issues affect the exchange value of the currency. A command economy that doesn’t rely on imports for its critical products and services can use alternative means to apportion and distribute them internally.

      • cfgaussian@lemmygrad.mlOP
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        11
        ·
        17 days ago

        You can also have a dual system. Gold backed currency for external trade, fiat currency for domestic economic activity.

      • GreatSquare@lemmygrad.ml
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        4
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        16 days ago

        China is attempting to create an equitable global economic system that works for all nations, not just itself. To do that, it has to consider how exchange rates are going to work for everyone.

        In a FULL gold standard system, theoretically a country cannot get that currency without having the same amount of gold in reserve. I doubt China will propose that because of the limitations that it implies.

    • Maeve@lemmygrad.ml
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      7
      ·
      17 days ago

      Idk about that. PMs are money. Everything else are promises that really don’t mean much, as history has demonstrated, multiple times.