Fed Chairs Must Check Their Conscience at the Reserve Door

Alan Greenspan was the 10^th Chair of the Council of Economic Advisors (CEA) under President Ford, so he was in the arena when Nixon pulled the plug on the gold standard and returning to the gold standard is not a discussion ever noted during his tenure at the CEA. He served as Chairman of the Federal Reserve from 1987 to 2006, under Presidents Reagan, H. W. Bush, Clinton and George W. Bush and through all of that, Greenspan never publicly recommended or discussed the benefits of returning to the gold standard. But now that he’s been away from the ether of the office for almost ten years, his economic senses seem to have returned, as he stated last week that, “Now if we went back on the gold standard and we adhered to the actual structure of the gold standard as it exists let’s say, prior to 1913, we’d be fine. Remember that the period 1870 to 1913 was one of the most aggressive periods economically that we’ve had in the United States, and that was a golden period of the gold standard.”

Apparently, the job of Federal Reserve Chairman has nothing to do with economic sensibility, rather the job is to keep the American public at least arms length from universal panic, at all cost. By all obvious accounts, the resume of a “qualified” candidate for the position should read like that of a master spin doctor. The recent Brexit vote has inserted the stability and universality of gold back into the economic spotlight. Considering today’s negative interest rates, currency devaluations and other economic acts of desperation, isn’t it about time for our global world to get a grip, come together and then create an economic base that everyone can count on, refer to and build upon?