Book description
For most of the last three millennia, the world's commercial centers
have used one or another variant of a gold standard. It should be one of
the best understood of human institutions, but it's not. It's one of the
worst understood, by both its advocates and detractors. Though it has
been spurned by governments many times, this has never been due to a
fault of gold to serve its duty, but because governments had other plans
for their currencies beyond maintaining their stability. And so, says
Nathan Lewis, there is no reason to believe that the great monetary
successes of the past four centuries, and indeed the past four
millennia, could not be recreated in the next four centuries. In
Gold,
he makes a forceful, well-documented case for a worldwide return to the
gold standard.
Governments and central bankers around the world today
unanimously agree on the desirability of stable money, ever more so
after some monetary disaster has reduced yet another economy to
smoking ruins. Lewis shows how gold provides the stability needed to
foster greater prosperity and productivity throughout the world. He
offers an insightful look at money in all its forms, from the seventh
century B. C. to the present day, explaining in straightforward
layman's terms the effects of inflation, deflation, and floating
currencies along with their effect on prices, wages, taxes, and debt.
He explains how the circulation of money is regulated by central banks
and, in the process, demystifies the concepts of supply, demand, and
the value of currency. And he illustrates how higher taxes diminish
productivity, trade, and the stability of money. Lewis also provides
an entertaining history of U. S. money and offers a sobering look at
recent currency crises around the world, including the Asian monetary
crisis of the late 1990s and the devastating currency devaluations in
Russia, China, Mexico, and Yugoslavia.
Lewis's ultimate conclusion is simple but powerful: gold has been
adopted as money because it works. The gold standard produced decades
and even centuries of stable money and economic abundance. If history
is a guide, it will be done again.
Nathan Lewis was formerly the chief international economist of
a firm that provided investment research for institutions. He now
works for an asset management company based in New York. Lewis has
written for the Financial Times, Asian Wall Street
Journal, Japan Times, Pravda, and other publications. He has
appeared on financial television in the United States, Japan, and the
Middle East.
Nathan Lewis was formerly the chief international
economist of a leading economic forecasting firm. He now works for an
asset management company based in New York. Lewis has written for the
Financial Times, the Wall Street Journal Asia, the Japan Times,
Pravda, and other publications. He has appeared on financial
television in the United States, Japan, and the Middle East.
