Ron Paul Asks Ben Bernanke: How Do You Define a Dollar?

Again, Ron Raul is the voice of reason. He brings up great points on how our economy really is with how weak the dollar is comped to gold.

What is the definition of a dollar?

Well, what ever the definition of a dollar is
a "federal reserve note" isn't it.

I know I have some Canadian silver 5 dollar coins ( Olympic Maples)
and thay are worth 50 bucks USD and darn near that in CAD too on Ebay to day

so whats a dollar?

reply to post by ugie1028


Nice find S + F from dis guy! It sickens me how often the one man who, right or wrong, has common sense answers to the problems we face is portrayed as a nutcase by ALL major media outlets. Complexity for the sake of complexity has been the economic norm in our country for too long.

Thanks for the post, I didn't see that video before.

Ron Paul is the voice of reason. I disagree with him on some things, but there is not a more honest, rational person in Congress than him. In fact, I voted for him last go around and will do so again if he runs.

I'm not an economist and don't know if going back to the gold standard will work, but I do know this, if Congress doesn't stop spending, spending, spending and the Fed doesn't stop printing, printing, printing......

SHTF.....

After that...we will use gold, it will be the only thing worth anything.

reply to post by ugie1028


So a dollar is defined by the goods and services that it can buy. Ok, I can see that. So when the cost of the goods and services climbs rapidly without a simultaneous increase in value, then that is inflation, based on my understanding.

So it seems to me that inflation is out of control, since cost of living has gone up a lot but value has not matched.

reply to post by Hoping4Wisdom


Ron Paul is exposing the lies and deceit that has been pushed on the Freeworld for decades by TPTB that control the MSM.

The Dollar is likely to collapse within the next 12 Months and the U.S will experience inflation to a far greater extent than the U.K experienced in the 1970's. The Dollar will lose the status of reserve currency and the entire economy will collapse.

If I were Ron Paul I would be demanding that the reserve opens up Fort Knox for an immediate audit of the Gold reserves. Unfortunately though I think you will find that all the Gold was sold off by the Federal Reserve at least 40 years ago.

reply to post by Cobaltic1978


I've been expecting hyperinflation any day now. With all the electronic "dollars" recently "created," there is nothing less TO expect.

Ron, you tell it like it is! Thanks OP!

reply to post by Amaterasu


I was only very young, maybe three years old when hyperinflation hit the U.K. The Government of the day had no control over it and this lasted for at least ten years.

Living standards were not great, but we all got by. Unfortunately we do live in different times and I fear for my U.S cousins. Peace.

Originally posted by rogerstigers
reply to post by ugie1028

 

So a dollar is defined by the goods and services that it can buy. Ok, I can see that. So when the cost of the goods and services climbs rapidly without a simultaneous increase in value, then that is inflation, based on my understanding.

So it seems to me that inflation is out of control, since cost of living has gone up a lot but value has not matched.

You are right, so basically he is saying that a dollar is worth how much milk you can buy with it, or how much mortgage, but he avoids saying how much of something tangible and secure like gold it can be redeemed for. A dollar is defined by how much faith you have in the government and now today China announced that they will let the Yuan appreciate.

SHTF is coming to a Wal-Mart near you!

Off topic for RogersTigers:

I got three of the four lines in your signature. Line one is lyrics from Californication by the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Line three is a paraphrase or summary of 1 James in the Bible, and line four is from your own post in This ATS Thread. Where is line 2 from?

Originally posted by Cobaltic1978
reply to post by Amaterasu

 

I was only very young, maybe three years old when hyperinflation hit the U.K. The Government of the day had no control over it and this lasted for at least ten years.

Living standards were not great, but we all got by. Unfortunately we do live in different times and I fear for my U.S cousins. Peace.

I'm thinking "money in a wheelbarrow to buy a loaf of bread" hyperinflation. Like pre-Nazi Germany hyperinflation...

Glad you survived the hyperinflation of your day. And thanks for you well-wishes.

Originally posted by tsawyer2
Off topic for RogersTigers:

I got three of the four lines in your signature. Line one is lyrics from Californication by the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Line three is a paraphrase or summary of 1 James in the Bible, and line four is from your own post in This ATS Thread. Where is line 2 from?

You are correct on #1.
#2 comes from a bumber sticker sitting here on my desk
#3 is something I made up spur of the moment in ATS Chat the other day.. although, it is probably derived from a recorded passage in my head from the bible.. One can never have an original thought
#4 is indeed from that thread.



Now back to our regularly scheduled thread,

Bernanke is such a puppet!

Ron Paul definitely has been arguing some good points lately.

On the lines of his contextual Bernanke quote: "Gold isn't money" I completely disagree. The federal reserve has distributed fiat currency under the pretense that it is backed by silver and precious metals. It has been void of matching those dollars for sometime, thus making every dollar that has been created since backed basically by debt.

Debt to the country's people, debt to other countries, debt to wars, debt to everything and everybody. Its a crock, and a scam that we have been letting run for far too long.

So yes, in fact your dollar is less than air, it is debt. Our country is 12+ trillion dollars in debt. Soon to come crashing down when our debtors see that the dollar is worth of lesser value than a green sheet of toilet paper.

I am just waiting for the part where Mr. Paul reminds Mr. Bernanke that inflation numbers are not a true measure of real inflation , when we consider just how many items are not factored into " inflation "

Oops.

-Delete this-

The simple answer is that as a member of Congress, Ron Paul should be able to give that answer fairly readily as per the US Constitution:

Article 1, Section 8
The Congress shall have power...

To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures;

The fact that it was turned over to the Federal Banking Reserve was wrong, and that Bernanke can not give a direct uniform value is frightening.

But then again, my definition of a dollar is a dollar's worth of labor. For minimum wage of $7.25/hr that is roughly 8 minutes and 17 seconds. The rank and file of Congress receive $174,000/yr. Since that is a flat rate and they often have longer sessions with several breaks, let's just assume a 40 hour week 52 weeks a year for $83.65 an hour. That is 43 seconds work for a dollar.

In other words, by the time a minimum wage worker at Mc Donalds has made $1 working the drive thru by filling 3 orders and welcoming the next car (company average time is 2 minutes 36 seconds). A Congressman (that isn't fulfilling the Constitutionally mandated requirements of the job) has made $11.56

That is the problem of describing relative purchasing power as the value of a dollar. Because assuming no other expenses, a 2011 Hyundai Accent GL for $10,705 (not including tax, title and destination charges--the cheapest car on the market). The worker at Mc Donald's will have to work roughly 1469 hours (or 37 weeks without income tax withholdings) the Congressman roughly 128 hours (or 3.2 weeks--same no income tax deductions) to pay for that car. Figure in average cost of living and it extends that timeframe naturally.

Fiat currency's greatest flaw is the relative purchasing power versus the amount of labour required to obtain it. And to put it all in perspective, as Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Congress paid Bernanke $199,700 in 2010. Which is less than Ron Paul was paid.

A dollar is a unit of trade.

Trade is the transaction of supply and demand.

As more new money enters the market, the ruler that measures trade throughout society becomes longer. This means that more units are needed to perform the same transaction and is called inflation.

Originally posted by rogerstigers
reply to post by ugie1028

 

So a dollar is defined by the goods and services that it can buy. Ok, I can see that. So when the cost of the goods and services climbs rapidly without a simultaneous increase in value, then that is inflation, based on my understanding.

So it seems to me that inflation is out of control, since cost of living has gone up a lot but value has not matched.

This should be a bumper sticker.

Originally posted by AsimpleAbstraction
Bernanke is such a puppet!

Ron Paul definitely has been arguing some good points lately.

On the lines of his contextual Bernanke quote: "Gold isn't money" I completely disagree. The federal reserve has distributed fiat currency under the pretense that it is backed by silver and precious metals. It has been void of matching those dollars for sometime, thus making every dollar that has been created since backed basically by debt.

Debt to the country's people, debt to other countries, debt to wars, debt to everything and everybody. Its a crock, and a scam that we have been letting run for far too long.

So yes, in fact your dollar is less than air, it is debt. Our country is 12+ trillion dollars in debt. Soon to come crashing down when our debtors see that the dollar is worth of lesser value than a green sheet of toilet paper.

Maybe the Fed is running a big bluff on the value of the dollar. Like bring the value of a dollar down slowly to a certain point. So that they could begin to cover the value of the Dollar with precious metal's and move beyond a crash to zero scenario. That could enable value generated growth(as a cheaper dollar would encourage investment with sounder money[backed by gold, precious metal's]) that in hypothesis could beat back the Silent Depression.

reply to post by korathin


Lol.. I would have to condense it down to a five word catch phrase..