I get it that gold is insurance against inflation. And, it's real money in an economic catastrophe.
My question is on behalf of the Anons who may have purchased some gold coins (but lost them in the lake). If we paid $1000 for one 1oz coin, and the US goes back to a gold-backed standard and values gold at $35/oz., that is quite a loss! I am not that is what will happen, but I present that scenario as part of the broader question: What would gold need to be valued at in our fiat US$ currency in order to be the backing?
Any Anons have a sense for the future value of a gold coin in the gold-backed dollar scenario? A lot of people have purchased gold coins hoping that they will revalue north of $20K or $50K to accommodate all of the fiat floating around. But I just can't see the elites letting people get "rich" so easily.
The gold standard works, in theory, if they only print money that they have gold to back it with. This is what the US did, and every dollar could be redeemed for its equivalent in gold. In this sense, they didn’t ‘fix’ the price of gold, but the currency perpetually reflected the direct value of gold. The government held the gold in trust and people used notes as a more convenient method of transaction.
This worked perfectly for a century until the banks and the government pulled off a nifty little trick. They took all of the gold (wealth) backing the currency for themselves, and convinced the people that the paper notes on their own had value. And then they printed more of those notes for themselves, and used them to buy up key industries and influence. Fast forward a bit and we find ourselves where we are now.