Mart Educating America on the Federal Reserve
Ron Paul was initially motivated to join Congress based on reading Hajek's "The Road to Serfdom." This launched him into the study of Austrian (free market) economics which predicted the fall of the Soviet Union, and America's departure from the gold standard.
Based on his deep understanding of economics, Dr Paul has focused on trying to hold the Federal Reserve bank accountable, or to abolish it, and return to a gold standard. This is a difficult issue for people to understand, but is vitally important, as the Federal Reserve system is believed by many economists to be responsible for the Great Depression, the stagflation of the 70s, and the recent dot-com bust. It's directly responsible for the inflation that has decreased the worth of a dollar down to 4 cents over the past century. This inflation is in essence a hidden tax that has allowed the government to grow larger than it would have been able to through direct taxation. I advise anyone who has been impressed with Dr Paul's stance for freedom in foreign policy and at home to look into this complex issue.
There is a good article by Dr Paul and Lew Rockwell at Daily Paul. And the following video is long, but does a great job describing the issue:
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At the end of the video, they suggest the move to a gold standard could happen first in a small state, then they show a picture of New Hampshire!!
Interesting article on Milton Friedman's views:
Why wouldn't a market-based gold standard be feasible or desirable under present circumstances? Friedman explained his reasoning in an April 1976 lecture entitled "Has Gold Lost Its Monetary Role?" that was delivered in Johannesburg, South Africa. Simply put, governments are no longer willing to be restrained by a gold standard. They want control over money for various macroeconomic manipulative purposes. However, Friedman said that
"if you could re-establish a world in which government's budget accounted for 10 percent of the national income, in which laissez-faire reigned, in which governments did not interfere with economic activities and in which full employment policies had been relegated to the dustbin, in such a world you might be able to restore a real gold standardŠ. A real honest-to-God gold standard is not feasible because there is essentially no government in the world that is willing to surrender control over its domestic monetary policy."
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