

Comparing and Contrasting the Great Depression With the Current US Economic Crisis - simitpatel
http://www.informedtrades.com/237417-comparing-great-depression-crisis-2008-a.html

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sdurkin
Grrr... Austrian economics. The ultimate value of a currency has never been
shiny metal, even when we were on the gold standard. The value of a currency
is that it allows you to invest in companies in a particular country. That is,
if you think there are a lot of companies in the US that are going to return
high profits, you need to exchange your money for the USD.

This line is laughable: "It is easiest to define "real value" as the price in
gold." Why is this any more valid than the price in silver, corn, wheat,
dollars, yen, or cocoa puffs?

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ConradHex
Is it because the supply of gold is, in theory, somewhat stable?

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sdurkin
It is, but not only is that not true in practice, its irrelevant. Gold is an
industrial good, just like anything else. Its price fluctuates for a variety
of reasons, including simple changes in taste.

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lionheart
"Moreover, unlike Japan and like Argentina and Iceland, the US is a debtor
nation -- not a lender. This increases the likelihood of a run on the
currency, which will result in significant currency devaluation."

I'm confused. Isn't Japan's national debt about 120% of its GDP? And our is
about 75%. Doesn't that make Japan more of a debtor nation than us?

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mattchew
I'm guessing, but the article is probably talking about total debt, public +
private. IIRC Japan has lots of govt debt, but private savings. U.S. has high-
average govt debt and also lots of private debt.

The sentence is certainly arguable, I agree.

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ojbyrne
Last line: "Disclosure: Long gold and silver." That was about as predictable
as winter in December in Canada.

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s_baar
Austrian BCT ftw! Well, at least China's not going to put up with it. They're
grumbling for a new reserve currency, and hopefully that will be backed up by
something of stable value and finite quantities.

