More reasons to use the Liberty Dollar...

[Little Owl]

This will happen so long as they peg their value to FRNs but use real precious metals to make them.

Exactly, so what's the point of Liberty Dollars if they're pegged to Federal Inflation Notes?  Why not simply mint gold and silver coins whose value is based on their metal content?

[Ron Helwig]

This will happen so long as they peg their value to FRNs but use real precious metals to make them.

Exactly, so what's the point of Liberty Dollars if they're pegged to Federal Inflation Notes?  Why not simply mint gold and silver coins whose value is based on their metal content?

The point of using Liberty Dollars is that they CAN be used as currency, unlike plain gold or silver rounds. Until a massive educational change has occurred, most people will believe that their FRNs are the only money that matters.

The Liberty Dollar being marked with a "retail price" in FRNs allows it to be used in trade.

Imagine going to a hardware store for a box of nails and having the clerk look up the spot price of steel. What is the spot price of the wood in the handle of the hammer? What is the spot price of the hardened steel in the hammer's head?

[Lloyd Danforth]

Imagine going to a hardware store for a box of nails and having the clerk look up the spot price of steel. What is the spot price of the wood in the handle of the hammer? What is the spot price of the hardened steel in the hammer's head?

The spot price of steel (probably pig iron)at the time the raw material is purchased is part of the ultimate retail price, for these items.  I see from the two different size $5.00 LD's  I carry in my pocket that this is  a consideration for them too!

[error]

I just have these one-ounce and half-ounce round things made of silver. Sometimes they have funny writing on them, and sometimes they don't. They're all the same to me.

[Little Owl]

The point of using Liberty Dollars is that they CAN be used as currency, unlike plain gold or silver rounds

There's absolutely no reason that "plain" silver and gold rounds cannot be used as currency.  The markups on silver/gold rounds are small (~5-10%), whereas the markups on Liberty Dollars are in the 50-100% range.

[Dave Ridley]

mentioned the LD to dr. paul the other day....because he was talking about starting a new u.s. gold backed currency while maintaining the FRN.   i figured starting a new official u.s. currency would waste money so i suggested just endorsing the liberty dollar instead as our second currency.  that would be free.

it's funny...i don't ever go up to him and make suggestions but sometimes we just end up in the same spot and other people are asking questions so conversation happens. 

imagine back in the days when it was like this with SITTING presidents!

[Little Owl]

i suggested just endorsing the liberty dollar instead as our second currency.  that would be free

It is NOT free.  The markups on the Liberty Dollar are substantial.  We already have a national "currency" backed by gold.  American Eagle gold coins are easy to buy and cost only a few percent over bullion.  In fact, with the exception of the 1/4th oz coin, the ratio of "face value" dollars to gold content is a constant.  You could simply define "One Gold Dollar" equal to 1/50th oz of gold.

[mvpel]

Saying that the "spot price" should be used in exchange is endorsing theft.

The "spot price" is the price per ounce of a 500oz ingot in New York City.  Saying that one should use spot price as a ratio of exchange is saying that the trucker who shipped the ingot, and the mint that bought the expensive equipment they used to form the one ounce piece, should not be paid for their time and labor.

[dalebert]

I'm still with Little Owl on this one.

The markups on silver/gold rounds are small (~5-10%), whereas the markups on Liberty Dollars are in the 50-100% range.

As you can see, there are markups and it certainly seems reasonable to have some markup for the reasons you gave, but The Liberty Dollar seems like a racket that's marketing on our passion about an alternate currency. If I buy silver, I just can't imagine why I'd pay that kind of markup. If I were a merchant, I wouldn't accept a liberty dollar for face value unless someone was ready to guarantee me face value in return for it. I'd rather sell it to them for the cash and buy rounds at 5-10% markup and end up with quite a bit more silver.

[Dreepa]

I was with Little owl and dalebert.... but then I thought... are LDs at least a start?  Isn't it pointing in the right direction?  Think of the massive amounts of education that can happen with LDs... first introduce them to LDs ... Freedom next.

LDs they aren't perfect ... but a damn good start.

Dreepa Farm proudly accepts Liberty Dollars.

[Raineyrocks]

Has anybody looked into these electronic gold sites?  Are they trustworthy?

egold and other groups were raided by the feds earlier this year and accused of permitting illegal transactions. Even if an online site is run by good people, I would be very cautious.

I know it was like this in the USA before Comrade FDR stopped it, but it seems problematic to peg a currency to TWO metals simultaneously.  There's nothing to ensure a value ratio between say, silver and gold.

Bi-metal currency doesn't work. Ron Paul has mentioned a better method, which would likely be Misesian: http://www.lewrockwell.com/north/north83.html

I tried to read the article but I just don't understand it  .  Is the article saying that gold and silver is the best thing to have?  Sorry I get really confused about this stuff.

[Raineyrocks]

mentioned the LD to dr. paul the other day....because he was talking about starting a new u.s. gold backed currency while maintaining the FRN.   i figured starting a new official u.s. currency would waste money so i suggested just endorsing the liberty dollar instead as our second currency.  that would be free.

it's funny...i don't ever go up to him and make suggestions but sometimes we just end up in the same spot and other people are asking questions so conversation happens. 

imagine back in the days when it was like this with SITTING presidents!

That's pretty neat Dada.

[Little Owl]

The "spot price" is the price per ounce of a 500oz ingot in New York City.  Saying that one should use spot price as a ratio of exchange is saying that the trucker who shipped the ingot, and the mint that bought the expensive equipment they used to form the one ounce piece, should not be paid for their time and labor.

Pet peeve alert.  I just hate it when people argue a point that nobody made.  Nobody said we should not pay for the overhead of making gold/silver coins, but to charge 50-100% over spot silver/gold is just ripping people off.  I can buy silver and gold rounds for 5-10% over spot.  Paying as much more for the coins as Liberty Dollar buyers do means the currency is NOT based on the metal.  Its no different from the Federal Reserve minting coins/paper from progressively cheaper materials as the value of the dollar decreases.

Interestingly enough, the folks at Liberty Dollar must be somewhat sensitive to this as they're now allowing associates to buy gold libertys at 5-10% over spot.

The Liberty Dollar HAS inflated.  The one ounce $10 Liberty Dollar coin is now the $20 Liberty Dollar coin.

[Little Owl]

I was with Little owl and dalebert.... but then I thought... are LDs at least a start?  Isn't it pointing in the right direction?  Think of the massive amounts of education that can happen with LDs... first introduce them to LDs ... Freedom next.

While getting people accustomed to the idea of non FRN currency is a good idea, I think Liberty Dollars do more harm than good.  The education they produce may well be "Private currency is a scam" - not the message we want to send.

The better implementation would have been, define a "Liberty" in terms of fractional metal (Au or Ag) and stick to it.  Set the exchange rate based on spot prices.  A spread in the spot could finance the transactions (just like other currencies).  To pay for coinage, you could either work that into the exchange spread or add a surcharge for coinage.

Personally I'd work it into the exchange spread.  That way there would be no hesitation to use coin, paper, and electronic money interchangeably.

Charging people $20 for $12 worth of silver or $1,000 for $660 worth of gold will not hasten acceptance of private currency.  The arbitrary controls in price (relative to the US dollar) smacks of the same statism many are trying to escape.

[Little Owl]

Liberty Lobby did exactly this way back in the 1970's. They minted a one ounce silver Liberty and a one-half ounce silver Liberty

I didn't know that.  So what happened to them?