Value?
What's IT worth to you? IT has not been described nor defined. This essay is not about IT. This essay is about the concept of VALUE. This essay is about the concept of the VALUE of IT; The value of IT and what IT can be traded for.
Imagine that you have a pocket full of "IT" and you are hungry. Is the value of your IT sufficient to motivate a food vendor to trade you a meal for some of the IT in your pocket?
If the IT in your pocket looks similar to this image; You have been Lied to; Defrauded; and Harmed by the Federal United States government. (I will address the Federal United States government as the euphemism it is elsewhere.) What is the actual value of this (Federal Reserve Note) IT shown?
I was once as ignorant and uninformed as most of you presently are. You see, I am also a government public school graduate. Which means I had no knowledge regarding the value of IT in my pocket. The case could be made that this failure to educate was deliberate. It is my intent to provide information to negate the Government's deliberate attempts to keep you stupid. (Government is an Euphemism.)
Most of you have never been exposed to a reason to examine your understanding of your concept of money. Your nescience starts to end now.
Money is anything which is accepted as a medium of exchange and it may be classified into the following forms:
1. Commodity money
2. Receipt money
3. Fiat money
4. Fractional money
Commodity money
Salary has its roots in relation to salt. From Latin salarium "an allowance, a stipend, a pension," said to be originally "salt-money". Pecuniary has its roots in relation to cattle. From Latin pecuniarius "pertaining to money," from pecunia "money, property, wealth," from pecu "cattle, flock,"
Commodity money is any item that is used to measure relative values compared to other items. I'll trade you 24 apples for 12 eggs.
Salt has an unlimited shelf life (so long as the shelf it's on doesn't get flooded). Once sources of salt were found that didn't need extraordinary effort to mine and transport, salt's value disappeared making it no longer an item with a high value suitable for use as money.
Gold and Silver have unlimited shelf life, are easy to assay, are just rare enough to hold their value, and have other uses thus giving them intrinsic value as a commodity.
Receipt Money
Silver is heavy. Gold is heavier. A Receipt (A $100 Silver Certificate)
for 5.25 pounds of silver is much lighter in your pocket than the 5.25 pounds of silver. This receipt can also be folded. The exchange value of
the receipt is the same exchange value of 5.25 pounds of silver. Possession of the receipt is ownership of the receipt, and thus
ownership of the silver and the value the receipt represents.
The U.S. dollar was receipt money. In fact the receipt money of the U.S. was a silver certificate. In short that certificate was an IOU. On its face were these words:
SILVER CERTIFICATE ● THIS CERTIFIES THERE IS ON DEPOSIT IN THE TREASURY OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA ● ONE DOLLAR IN SILVER PAYABLE TO THE BEARER ON DEMAND
This Silver Certificate is a bona fide IOU. It states very specifically to give to the bearer one dollar in silver. This is known as a "Constitutional Dollar". This IOU says that the holder is owed 371.25 grains, 0.84 ounces, or 0.77 Troy ounces of pure silver. The Spanish dollar was the coin upon which the original United States dollar was based (at 0.7735 troy ounces or 24.06 grams).
An IOU does state the value of what is owed. For instance, "I Owe You one dozen extra large eggs" has exactly the value of a dozen extra large eggs. This IOU can be redeemed, that is, exchanged for one dozen extra large eggs.
Fiat Money
Fiat is an "authoritative sanction," from Latin fiat "let it be done". Fiat Money is a currency you have been commanded to accept as "Legal Tender". Legal Tender means you must accept whatever the Legal Tender currency being tendered (offered or given) in payment for a debt. Fiat Money has no intrinsic value. Its only value is that you have been taught and ordered to treat it like it's actually money and not the worthless IOU note it actually is.
Fractional Money
Fractional Money is in essence, fraudulent Receipt Money in circulation.
Imagine if the I Owe You one dozen extra large eggs notes became the legal tender of the U.S.? When you attempt to redeem it for one dozen extra large eggs you find out that its value has decreased.
Why? How?
Your government started printing the I Owe You one dozen extra large eggs notes and by law forces each one to only be worth six extra large eggs despite what it says on the IOU.
What is a Federal Reserve Note's value? If those 12 egg notes were FRN's, they could only be exchanged for 6/10 of an egg. That is how much the value of the FRN's has decreased since they were introduced in 1913.
Imagine being paid a 12 egg note that was worth 12 eggs until after you've held it awhile. Now it's worth 6/10 of an egg.
What's the IT in your pocket worth?
Is the IT in your pocket worth 371.25 grains, 0.84 ounces, or 0.77 Troy ounces of pure silver?
Did your government school teach you or make you aware of this? Mine didn't and mine was better than many.