Anniversary of Nixon Closing the Gold Window (Video)

Forty-three years ago today, President Nixon severed the last remaining shred of the gold standard when he suspended the ability of foreign banks to directly exchange the dollar for gold. Nixon promised his actions would be temporary, but this turned out to be an even bigger lie than his promise to end the Vietnam War.

In the video below, you’ll notice that Nixon also promised that the value of the dollar would remain stable in spite of his actions. Of course, this turned out to be completely wrong. According to the Consumer Price Index data released by the Bureau Labor of Statistics, the dollar has lost more than 80% of its value since Nixon’s fateful decision. Meanwhile, the dollar value of gold has gone from $35 an ounce to about $1,300.

What does this mean? Suppose you stashed an ounce of gold worth $35 alongside thirty-five one-dollar bills under your bed in 1971. Today, you would be sitting on gold that could buy you a nicely-tailored suit, while the cash couldn’t get you a pack of fancy boxer shorts. Who knows how much worse this is going to get. In our latest Videocast, Peter Schiff talks with Jim Rickards about the very real possibility that in the coming years, the dollar might lose its status as the world’s reserve currency. When that happens, you won’t even be able to buy a burger with your thirty-five bills. Click here to watch the interview.

There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose.” – John Maynard Keynes

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