One: buying gold is short selling the dollar. There is no other way to look at it, in my view. Had you bought a ton of gold in 1812, you would have lost a third of your money in the last two centuries. Had you put it in the stock market, you would have realized at least a tenfold increase in constant dollars, and likely much more.
These rough stats are from Thomas Sowell’s “Basic Economics”, which is excellent in everything but his treatment of the Fed. He understands it, and fractional reserve banking, but does not connect the dots. This is a persistent failure across the board with all economists not willing to endure being called cranks.
Two: when we were on the fractional reserve gold standard, our government bought the gold, did it not? We the People bought the gold, either through the allocation of taxes, or through the Federal Reserve creating money for the purpose, and hence taxing us indirectly through inflation.
This gold, then, belongs to Us. When is some Senator or other elected official going to have the balls to ask what happened to it? Nixon just ended the tenuous gold standard we have been on since Bretton Woods, but did not speak as to what was going to be done with the gold.
Why can’t we sell it on the open market to defray our debts? This is literally a trillion dollar question. Who has the balls to ask it besides me?
If we start down this path, I think everyone knows a stinking can of worms will get opened, but it is one that NEEDS to get opened.