Processen bygger på att banken lånar ut nästan alla pengar den får in. En del, några få procent, måste ligga som kassareserv hos centralbanken. Det kallas för fraktionell reserv. Hur stor denna reserv är varierar mellan olika länder.

I Sverige och på flera andra håll är detta kassakrav dock noll. I teorin skulle alltså bankernas tillverkning av pengar kunna fortsätta i all oändlighet.

Tillgångars värde går upp och ned och är ofta en fråga om subjektiva bedömningar.

– Lite skämtsamt kan man säga att om vi båda kommer överens om att din katt är värd hundra miljoner kan du få låna 80 miljoner av mig, säger Peter Borsos.

något slags system där pengars värde återigen kopplas till något mer handfast

Men utan att det baseras på brist såsom guld. Guld får tyvärr sitt värde på grund av brist. Det kan man inte bygga välstånd och överflöd på.

Common Objections to Gold
In any debate about the gold standard, certain objections are repeatedly
raised by opponents of monetary freedom, even though those
objections have been refuted many times before. Some of these objections
are:
1) There is not enough gold;
2) The Soviet Union and South Africa, since they are the principal
producers of gold, would benefit from our creation of a gold
standard;
3) The gold standard causes panics and crashes;
4) The gold standard causes inflation;
5) Gold is subject to undesirable speculative influences.

The first objection, there isn't enough gold, is based upon a misunderstanding
of a gold standard. It assumes that the present exchange
ratio (or a lower ratio) between a weight of gold and a greenback is the
exchange ratio that must prevail in a gold standard. Such obviously is
not the case. Doubling the exchange ratio, for example, doubles the
money supply. Lower prices under a gold standard eliminate the necessity
for such large sums. One can buy a suit that costs 400 paper dollars
with 20 gold dollars.
In 1979, there were a total of 35,000 metric tons of gold in central
banks and non-Communist government treasuries alone. The United
States government, officially holding 264 million ounces (8,227 tons),
owns about one-fourth of that total. The best estimate on the total
amount of gold in the world is three billion ounces, meaning that about
one-third of the world's gold is held by governments and central banks,
and two-thirds by private persons. Far from being a dearth of gold,
there are enormous amounts in existence. Gold, unlike most commodities,
remains in existence. It is not burned or consumed, and the
amounts actually lost are insignificant when compared to the amounts
now in public and private possession.
The second objection, concerning the Soviet Union and South Africa,
is equally groundless. These nations, as the world's largest producers
of gold, have profited handsomely from the massive increase in gold
prices in the past 10 years. Such increases do not occur under a gold
standard.
Recently a newsmagazine reported that "the Soviet Union holds an
estimated 60 million ounces of gold and has unmined reserves of perhaps
250 million ounces more. At today's prices that would give the
Soviets a $146 billion stranglehold on western economies." But let us
put these figures in perspective. Below is a table showing the gold
holdings of major central banks.

Official Gold Holdings
September 30,1979
(tons)
United States 8,227
Canada 657
Austria 657
Belgium 1,063
France 2,546
German Federal Republic 2,961
Italy 2,074
Japan 754
Netherlands 1,367
Portugal 689
South Africa 374
Switzerland 2,590
U.K 584
OPEC 1,207
Other Asia 607
Other Europe 1,209
Other Middle East 461
Other Western Hemisphere 654
Rest of World 320
Unspecified 113
Total 29,110
IMF 3,217
European Monetary
Cooperation Fund 2,664
This table, taken from the Annual Bullion Review 1980 of Samuel Montagu & Co., is based
on IMF statistics.

The Soviet Union's alleged 60 million ounces is less than 1,900 tons,
less than one-fourth of the U.S. official gold holdings. Even the alleged
250 million ounces of "unmined reserves" are less than the United
States has in Fort Knox and our other bullion depositories.
Consolidated Gold Fields Ltd. of London has estimated the net outflow
of gold from the Communist empire:
Year Net Outflow (tons)
1970 -3
1971 54
1972 213
1973 275
1974 220
1975 149
1976 412
1977 401
1978 410
1979 199
1980 90

In 1976, the Soviets exported 412 tons, 1.2 percent of the governmental
holdings of the non-Communist world. Assuming they could
export at this rate continuously—a very doubtful assumption—it would
take them almost a century just to match current official holdings. If
one includes private holdings, the percentage drops to about one-half
of one percent, and the time required extends to more than two centuries.
The fear of the Soviet Union and South Africa either dumping
or withholding gold and thereby wrecking a gold standard by altering
significantly the purchasing power of gold is baseless. The only reasons
sales by such governments now influence the market is that official
holdings are immobilized and the value of the paper dollar fluctuates
violently. Were we to institute a gold standard, those holdings would
once again enter the market. We should stop giving such windfalls to
the Soviets and South Africans as they have enjoyed during the last 10
years. The real fear should be the massive increase in the money supply
caused by the Federal Reserve in the last 10 years and the probability
of still further massive inflation. The red herring of external shock
destroying a gold standard is designed to distract one's attention from
the threat of internal shock caused by the Federal Reserve.
The third objection, that the gold standard causes panics and crashes,
is also false. The extensive examination of the monetary history of the
United States during the 19th century demonstrated that it was not the
gold standard, but government intervention in the banking systems,
that caused the problems. The legal prohibition of branch and interstate
banking prevented the prompt and convenient clearing of notes issued
by those banks. Frequent suspensions of specie payments were special
privileges extended to the banks by the government. Fractional reserves,
wildcat banking, the National Banking System, and the issuance of
greenbacks all contributed to the instability experienced during the
19th century.
But even with these interventions, as long as the dollar was defined
as a weight of gold, the benevolent influences of the gold standard
were felt. Chapter two of the Commission's report indicates that the
problems of the 19th century were due to abuses and lapses of the gold
standard, not the standard itself. Victor Zarnowitz has found evidence
that the so-called recessions of 1845, 1869, 1887, and 1899 were mere
pauses in growth.1 Jeffrey Sachs categorized recessions since 1893 by
their severity. He found only one strong and one moderate contraction
^'Business Cycles and Growth: Some Reflections and Measures," NBER Working Paper
#665, April 1981.
162
in the period of 1893-1913. Since the institution of the Federal Reserve,
however, we have had three strong contractions and three—now four—
moderate contractions.

Economist Alan Reynolds has pointed out:
Michael Parly found that unemployment rates in the 1930's had been
exaggerated by failure to count those on government work programs
. . . as employed. When the adjusted unemployment rate is added to
the consumer inflation rate to arrive at Art Okun's "discomfort index/'
the last two administrations experienced the worst combination of
inflation and unemployment (16 per cent) of any in this century except
for Franklin Roosevelt's first term (15.7 per cent) and President Wilson's
second (19.6 per cent). Unemployment averaged more than 7 per
cent from 1975 to date. From 1899 to 1929, unemployment reached 7
per cent in only two years. We are in no position to be smug about
the relative performance of a seemingly old-fashioned monetary standard.
The fact is that it worked very well under conditions more
difficult than those we face today.3
In a report prepared by EMB Ltd. and submitted to the Commission,
it was stated that "in the United States there were 12 panics and crises
between 1815 and 1914." Dr. Roy Jastram's testimony to the Commission
demolished that popular myth:
This draws upon a book by Willard Thorp, Business Annals, published
by the National Bureau of Economic Research in 1926. Year-by-year
Thorp gleaned his characterization of the year stated from the contemporary
press and writers of the day. When I was at the National Bureau
we considered Professor Wesley C. Mitchell as the patron saint of
objectivity. Mitchell wrote in the Introduction to Thorp's book: "'Crisis,'
then, is a poor term to use . . . But sad experience shows how
much misunderstanding comes from the effort to use familiar words
in new technical senses."
Both the Commission Staff and I agree that the true gold standard ran
between 1834-1861 and 1879-1914. Even with Professor Mitchell's
admonition about the use of the terms, this leaves us with 8 instead
of EMB's 12 "crises" or "panics" associated with a real gold standard.
A consultation of the original Thorp volume shows that EMB is simply
wrong about 1882 and 1890—Thorp does not label either of them as
"crisis" or "panic." So the count is reduced to 6. In 4 of these 6, part
2"The Changing Cyclical Behavior of Wages and Prices: 1890-1975," NBER Working
Paper #304, December 1978.
'Testimony before the United States Gold Policy Commission, Washington, D.C.,
November 13,1981.
163
of the year is called by Thorp "prosperity." Hence we have only 2 out
of the EMB's original 12 that were labeled in the original source as
being unmitigated crises or panics during an actual gold standard.
This kind of misinformation cannot go unchallenged.
And I might close with a thought of my own: if we were to use today
these terms in their archaic sense, every week of the past two years
could have been labeled a "panic."

TreeOfLiberty skrev:
Vad pratar du om egentligen?... Man kan inte leva utan ett ekonomiskt system, och människor kan inte "ta hand om varandra". Ett bra system blockar ute ekonomisk korruption, och det är det viktiga.

Om du nu är den smartaste ekonomen i världen, så får du gärna skriva här hur man kan leva utan ett ekonomiskt system. Hur kommer det sig att ingen i hela världen har kommit med ett sådant förslag tidigare?.

TreeOfLiberty skrev:
Quote:

Men utan att det baseras på brist såsom guld. Guld får tyvärr sitt värde på grund av brist. Det kan man inte bygga välstånd och överflöd på.

Att där skulle vara brist på guld verkar vara en myt som upprepas ofta, från vad jag har läst.

Avatar skrev:
Kan "man" inte leva utan ett ekonomiskt system?
...
En "skuld" utgjordes med att klyva en sticka i tu och när "skulden" var likviderad bröts båda stickorna.

Det finns fler och det finns kulturer idag som ej har ekonomi alls.

1. There simply is not enough gold for it to be used as money.

This is just like saying “we cannot possibly measure the size of microbes because inches are too large”. An excellent counterpoint to this line of thinking is to ask “what amount of gold will make it acceptable for use as money?”

Hoppe writes:

Once a money is established, any stock of money becomes compatible with any amount of employment and real income. There is never any need for more money since any amount will perform the same maximum extent of needed money work: that is, to provide a general medium of exchange and a means of economic calculation by entrepreneurs. [Source]

The total amount of gold that has ever been mined is 142,000 tonnes. If half of that gold disappeared, it would still be viable to use as money, and prices of goods would simply adjust downward to fit the quantity of money.

However, one could ask the question, "Could one ounce of gold serve as the monetary base?", or "If gold became as common as aluminum, would it still be useful as money?" Certainly the effort you'd have to put into buying a car (microscopes, nanotubes in the first case, perhaps a crane in the second) would change, and whatever means you are using to store your own money would have to adjust, but clearly, the answer is yes.

Similarly, if gold, which is a useful commodity is found to cure cancer, the non-monetary value of gold would cause a shift in the desirability to use it as currency... rather than a life saving cure.

A fundamental tenet to the Austrian analysis is an understanding of the origin of money. Gold became the most useful commodity to use as currency because of its particular characterisitcs. No one decided to use gold, it was just the best thing available at the time, and perhaps it still is.

The suitability of gold as a monetary base is the result of a number of different market factors. One of the factors is the value per weight. If it falls to that of aluminum or lead, then storage costs alone will undercut the usefulness of this element as currency. Silver may take its place. The fundamental truth, however, is that the commodity chosen by the market should be the one in use as currency.

The market seems to choose gold, and the shifts in its supply and value over the generations have not deterred them. One thing that people trust about gold is the relatively stable supply of it. It makes the value of gold somewhat predictable. A large shift SHOULD result in a market evaluation, but historically, these shifts have been fairly stable.

However, saying that "ANY" amount of gold will be enough to act as a medium of exchange misses the point. The market is fully capable of running on gold, but it wouldn't have evolved that way if gold did not have the characteristics that make it ideal for monetary exchange. If you posit a RADICAL change to those characteristics, such as supply, you will cause the market to re-evaluate its usefulness.

If India acquired ALL of the gold, that wouldn't mean we had no alternatives for a monetary base. All land and capital can serve as money, because money is just a type of capital. Indeed, land or commodity baskets may be preferred by the market outside an environment of market interference. Gold is a fantastic currency base, but it is far from the only one.

Men då skulle alla människor våldta naturen i jakt efter ett guldkorn som skulle kunna dubbla deras förmögenhet. Då skulle andra aktiviteter såsom att agera lärare inte bli utförda, Alla skulle vara ute i naturen och leta efter mikroskopiska guldkorn i varenda liten bäck istället för att producera välstånd.

Om en privatperson plötsligt hittade ett par kg nytt guld skulle denna individ bli rikaste privatpersonen i världen över en natt utan att ha producerat något välstånd. Det är en instabil bas för en valuta att basera det på brist.

TreeOfLiberty skrev:
När utbudet av pengar ökar i förhållande till allt annat, det kallas för inflation ...

tror du inte att folk kommer att välja att sluta att bli jordnöt bönder eftersom priset på jordnötter sjunker?.

Chriss skrev:
Men just det faktum att guld (och silver) inte går att skapa hur som helst av politiker eller bankirer är ju också dess styrka.

pingubenji skrev:

Om pengar skulle skapas genom produktion av välstånd och god hälsa så skulle samhället automatiskt producera välstånd och hälsa när det var brist på pengar. Om pengar dessutom försvann med försvunnet välstånd och hälsa så skulle det alltid finnas en drivkraft att skapa mer välstånd och hälsa.

Om alla människor kunde skapa pengar genom att arbeta fram välstånd så skulle inte banker ha makten. Då skulle människor ha makten. Det skulle vara så bra förtjänst att bygga välstånd att andra aktiviteter skulle vara direkt olönsamma och inte utföras.

Om penningmängden baserades på antal regnskogsträd i världen eller antal friska fria däggdjur så skulle vi direkt få bra miljö. Alla fattiga skulle plantera träd som de då ägde och lätt kunde sälja av med hög förtjänst.

Öknar skulle snabbt restaureras och bli regnskog. Djur skulle födas upp och släppas ut i syfte att öka bestånden av friska fria djur. De som gjorde detta skulle vara berättigad den del som penningmängden utökades med.

Jag har räknat på det. 400 miljarder träd. Träd verkar vara en bra parameter att basera penningmängden på.
Låt säga att varje människa vill kunna ha möjlighet att spara 1 miljon i dagens värde. Då har varje träd ett värde på 17000 sek. Med tanke på att vi halverat antalet träd de senaste 50 åren så finns det stora möjligheter att plantera träd. Alla skulle plantera träd tills det inte var lönsamt längre. Kvar efter denna omställning till en trädekonomi skulle vi ha en grönskande planet och mycket utrymme för djur att leva i. Och vi skulle inte behöva någon korrupt/jävig WWF.