The People Who Linked and Severed Gold and Paper Money

Course number: C11

Supervised by: Mitsuru Hayama

Beyond the text: 11 exercises · 2 coins · 13 readings · 2 references　How reading times are calculated

You will also understand

• You can point out what is missing from "go back to gold and things will be stable."
• Can narrate Japan's return to the gold standard (the old parity, the Shōwa Depression, terrorism), including the ultimate fates of the key figures.
• Can explain the end of the gold standard (from Bretton Woods to Camp David) from the perspective of the decision-making process.

You can start this course without reading any other course.

Also worth reading, to see the connections (optional)

• Face Value and Intrinsic Value
  What you learn: You can explain the gap between nominal and real value using one concrete coin.
  The text refers to this course in section 3.

If you want to know more about checking sources (optional)

• Is It Really True? Checking History
  We re-examine the origins of money and famous anecdotes, comparing them with historical records and actual artifacts.

Assessment

11 exercises in this course (7 check, 1 compare, 3 written). Progress is recorded by self-assessment.

1. It was a physicist who set the ratioThe gold standard did not begin with a declaration. A ratio was set, the undervalued silver left, and gold remained.
2. The theory was written while convertibility was suspendedThe theory was written not before the system but after it had stopped. Do not remember the order backwards.
3. What happened in the year of the returnThe trouble was not the gold standard itself but the rate of return. Match the nominal to the past and the real takes the pain.
4. The day the window was closedIn the end only the dollar was tied to gold. So when the dollar closed, everything came undone.
5. At the Old Parity — The Door of Inoue JunnosukeThe question was not whether to open it, but how. The choice of the old parity led to depression and an assassin's bullet.
6. Not the Glory of the Currency — Keynes's OppositionThe opposition to the return to the old parity was argued from the perspective of wages on the street. The prediction became reality the following year.
7. Entrusting Gold to a Single Nation — The Thirty-Five Dollars of the White PlanThe gold standard did not die; it rode on the back of the dollar. Thirty-five dollars per ounce of gold—the reality of the nation where the world's gold gathered.
8. A Weekend at the Mountain Lodge — August 1971The gold window was closed on Sunday night television. The administrative last day of a two-thousand-year metallic era.

• The mint in the Tower of London　Britain　Newton's Great Recoinage　1696
  §1. The scene of replacing clipped silver with milled coin.
• The Mint in the Tower of London　Britain　Newton's Great Recoinage　1717
  §1. Newton's report fixing the ratio. From here the silver goes out.
• Whitehall, the Treasury　Britain　Churchill's mistake　1925
  §3. The scene of the decision to return at the pre-war rate.
• The streets of London　Britain　Churchill's mistake　1926
  §3. What happened the year after the return. Read without settling on a single cause.
• The Bank of England　Britain　Churchill's mistake　1925–1931
  §3. How the man who decided looked back on it years later. ⚠ Mind the hedge "it is said."
• Bretton Woods, the seat of the British delegation　United States　Bretton Woods　July 1944
  §4. The plan that was not adopted. See what was different about it.
• Camp David, the lodge in Maryland　United States　15 August 1971　August 1971
  §4. The scene of the weekend on which the decision was taken.
• All America, before the television　United States　15 August 1971　15 August 1971
  §4. The three pillars announced on television. Check them in the original.
• From the lifting of the gold embargo to war　Japan　1930　Tokyo and the silk-raising villages
  Section 5. The choice of how to open the way, and its price. A record from an era when lives were on the line.
• London, a study　Britain　Churchill's mistake　1925
  Section 6. A real-world example of the art of dissent. Look to the wages in the street.
• Bretton Woods, the seat of the American delegation　United States　Bretton Woods　July 1944
  Section 7. The thirty-five-dollar design. The reality of power becomes the system.
• The gold of Brazil (3)　Portugal　the 18th century　The Royal Mint, London
  This stop looks at where the gold came from before the gold standard was established. Please trace why the gold mined in Brazil and passed through Lisbon remained in London.
• The Gold Never Came　India　1898–1913　The site of settlement
  This is an account of the gold standard from the perspective of a side that did not receive gold. Please ascertain the meaning of Keynes's rephrasing when, in a book written at the age of thirty, he called this not a gold standard but a pound sterling exchange standard.

• Gold Reserve Act of 1934 — Federal Reserve History (Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond ほか)　Signed on 1934-01-30. Transferred ownership of all monetary gold in the US to the Treasury and prohibited the redemption of dollars for gold.
• Roosevelt's Gold Program — Federal Reserve History　The United States was on a de facto gold standard from the 1830s and a de jure one from 1900, which was incorporated into the framework of the Federal Reserve System in 1913.

The books and materials referred to in this course.