Harper's Pictorial Library of the World War, Volume XII : $b The Great Results of the War
History
Harper's Pictorial Library of the World War, Volume XII : $b The Great Results of the War
League of Nations; Treaty of Versailles (1919 June 28); World War, 1914-1918; World War, 1914-1918 -- Economic aspects; World War, 1914-1918 -- Finance
Many impracticable plans have been proposed. Secretary Redfield
undertook to stabilize prices by arbitrarily fixing them. He failed,
necessarily. We might as well try to fix the sea level by pressing on
the ocean. The same, as I stated above, is true of a campaign against
profiteers though proposed by so high an authority as President Wilson.
PROPOSED REMEDY
The plan I shall here outline has received the approval of a large
number of leading economists, business men, and organizations,
including President Hadley of Yale; a committee of economists appointed
to consider the purchasing power of money in relation to the war; Frank
A. Vanderlip, president of the National City Bank of New York; George
Foster Peabody, Federal Reserve banker of New York; John Perrin, Federal
Reserve Agent of San Francisco; Henry L. Higginson, the veteran banker
of Boston; Roger W. Babson, statistician; John Hays Hammond, mining
engineer; John V. Farwell, of Chicago; Leo S. Rowe, Assistant Secretary
of the Treasury: United States Senator, Robert L. Owen, one of the
authors of the Federal Reserve Act; Ex-Senator Shafroth; the late
Senator Newlands; Sir David Barbour, one of the originators of the
Indian gold exchange standard; the Society of Polish Engineers; the New
England Purchasing Agents' Association; and a few Chambers of Commerce.
WANTED--A STANDARDIZED DOLLAR
Our dollar is now simply a fixed weight of gold--a unit of weight,
masquerading as a unit of value. It is almost as absurd to define a unit
of value, or general purchasing power, in terms of weight as to define a
unit of length in terms of weight. What good does it do us to be assured
that our dollar weighs just as much as ever? We want a dollar which will
always buy the same aggregate quantity of bread, butter, beef, bacon,
beans, sugar, clothing, fuel, and the other essential things that we
spend it for. What is needed is to stabilize or standardize the dollar
just as we have already standardized the yardstick, the pound weight,
the bushel basket, the pint cup, the horsepower, the volt, and, indeed,
all the units of commerce except the dollar.
Money today has two great functions. It is a medium of exchange and it
is a standard of value. Gold was chosen because it was a good medium,
not because it was a good standard. And so, because our ancestors found
a good medium of exchange, we now find ourselves saddled with a bad
standard of value!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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