U.S. territory quarters

[sk8ndestroy14]

H.R.392 is a bill that would create new quarters after the state quarter program ends that would honor the District of Columbia, United States Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, The commonwealth of Puerto Rico, and any other territories I might have forgotten. It's been tried five times everytime so far it has passed the House but not the senate. The closest they got was either 34 or 35 votes (I forget) in the senate with 51 needed (or 50 and the V.P. vote). This is the first attempt with the new democratically controlled 110th Congress. What does everybody think about this topic?

[joshSCH]

I hope it doesn't pass.. those territories are just American possessions and don't deserve a quarter (other than D.C.) since they aren't states ;)

[sk8ndestroy14]

I wouldn't mind if it passed. The government would also make money off of them.

[joshSCH]

The government would make money if coins were produced with specific U.S. possessions printed on them? How so?

[sk8ndestroy14]

Rep. Michael Castle [R-DE]: Madam Speaker, just in closing I thought I would reference back to what I said in the opening, and that is that this particular program which is known as the 50 State Quarter Program, has made a profit, if you want to call it that, through what we call seigniorage of about $6 billion for the Federal Government. How can that be? It is fairly simple: it costs about a nickel to make a quarter, and we essentially sell the quarters, if you will, for 25 cents; and that amount of money, that extra money is carried over, that 20 cents. And since none of these coins are being basically turned in because of all the collecting which is going on, this is money which the Federal Government can spend, it is called seigniorage, and it has worked out extraordinarily well.
This program not only honors and recognizes these very important entities that have been spoken to by their representatives here today, but also provides an opportunity for the Federal Government to continue to profit from this program, which will, by the end, end otherwise in the year 2008. So I would encourage everybody to vote for it.
I hope, to the distinguished woman from the District of Columbia, that the fifth time is good luck. We have had great luck here in the House; it is in the Senate that we seem to struggle a little bit, and hopefully we can get it done this time.
And let me make a point that I think is important. There has been a lot in the news lately about a delegate voting bill which some people here on the floor may be interested in. This is not that bill, and I am not either denigrating or advocating that bill today. But I think it is very important to understand what this is: it is just a clear recognition of those areas that have been left out of this quarter program that many of us think should be brought in and, for that reason, are very supportive of this legislation. Hopefully this is a bill which both political parties can be very supportive of when the time comes to vote on it.
Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

[joshSCH]

ahh.. icic.. never thought of it like that..

[sk8ndestroy14]

Yup, it would be cool to have some new coins circulating too.

[Dave Sinkula]

This has prompted me to revisit a book I'd mentioned elsethread, which I have since found as a pdf online.
http://www.mises.org/rothbard/rothmoney.pdf

[sk8ndestroy14]

What's it about?

[Dave Sinkula]

Short answer is just a click away...
Money. What Has Government Done to Our Money?

[sk8ndestroy14]

Yeah, I clicked it. I just didn't really bother to read much of it yet. It's about the different things the government has done with currency?

[Dave Sinkula]

Well, I won't C&P the whole thing, but I'll do that with the forward.

Introduction to Fourth Edition

Monetary policy is—aside from war—the primary tool of state aggrandizement. It ensures the growth of government, finances deficits, rewards special interests, and fixes elections. Without it, the federal leviathan would collapse, and we could return to the republic of the Founding Fathers.

Our monetary system is not only politically abusive, it also causes inflation and the business cycle. What is to be done?

In answer to that question, the Mises Institute is pleased to present this fourth and slightly expanded edition of Murray N. Rothbard's classic What Has Government Done to Our Money?.

First published in 1964, this is one of Professor Rothbard's most influential works, despite its length. I can't count the number of times academics and nonacademics alike have told me that it forever changed the way they looked at monetary policy. No one, having read this book, hears the pronouncements of Fed officials with awe, or reads monetary texts with credulity. What Has Government Done to Our Money? is the best introduction to money, bar none. The prose is straightforward, the logic relentless, the facts compelling—as in all of Professor Rothbard's writings. [7]

His themes here are theoretical, political, and historical. On theory, he agrees with Ludwig von Mises that money originated through voluntary exchanges on the market. No social contract or government edict brought money into being. It is a natural outgrowth of individuals seeking economic relations more complex than barter.

But unlike all other commodities, an increase in the stock of money confers no social benefit, since money's main function is to facilitate the exchange of other goods and services. Indeed, increasing the stock of money through a central bank like the Fed has horrific consequences, and Professor Rothbard provides the clearest explanation available of inflation.

In policy, he argues that the free market can and should be charged with the production and distribution of money. There is no need to make it a monopoly of the U.S. Treasury, let alone of a public-private banking cartel like the Fed.

A successful money needs only a fixed definition rooted in the commodity most suited to a monetary use, and a legal system that enforces contracts and punishes theft and fraud. In a free market, the result has been, and would be, a gold standard.

In such a free-market system, money would be convertible domestically and internationally. Demand deposits would have 100% reserves, while the reserve ratios for time deposits would be subject to the economic prudence of bankers and the watchful eye of the consuming public.

It is, however, the historical dimension of Professor [8] Rothbard's work that makes it so persuasive. Starting with the 19th-century classical gold standard, he ends with the likely emergence of a European Currency Unit and an eventual world fiat money. Especially notable are his explanations of the Bretton Woods system and the closing of the gold window in the early 1970s.

Professor Rothbard shows that government has always and everywhere been the enemy of sound money. Through banking cartels and inflation, government and its favored interests loot the people's earnings, water down the value of the market's money, and cause recessions and depressions.

In mainstream economics, most of this is denied or ignored. The emphasis is always on the "best" way to use monetary policy. What should guide the Fed? The GNP? Interest rates? The yield curve? The foreign exchange value of the dollar? A commodity index? Professor Rothbard would tell us that all such questions presuppose central planning, and are the root of monetary evil.

May this book be distributed far and wide, so that when the next monetary crisis arrives, Americans will, finally, refuse to put up with what the government is doing to our money.

Llewellyn H. Rockwell
The Ludwig von Mises Institute
Auburn University
November 1990