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–/+ Gold StandardLawrence H. Officer, University of Illinois at ChicagoThe gold standard is the most famous monetary system that ever existed. The periods in which the gold standard flourished, the groupings of countries under the gold standard, and the dates during which individual countries adhered to this standard are delineated in the first section. Then characteristics of the gold standard (what elements make for a gold standard), the various types of the standard (domestic versus international, coin versus other, legal versus effective), and implications for the money supply of a country on the standard are outlined. The longest section is devoted to the "classical" gold standard, the predominant monetary system that ended in 1914 (when World War I began), followed by a section on the "interwar" gold standard, which operated between the two World Wars (the 1920s and 1930s). Countries and Dates on the Gold StandardCountries on the gold standard and the periods (or beginning and ending dates) during which they were on gold are listed in Tables 1 and 2 for the classical and interwar gold standards. Types of gold standard, ambiguities of dates, and individual-country cases are considered in later sections. The country groupings reflect the importance of countries to establishment and maintenance of the standard. Center countries--Britain (since 1801 with legal name "the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland") in the classical standard, the United Kingdom (since 1922 with legal name "the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland") and the United States in the interwar period -- were indispensable to the spread and functioning of the gold standard. Along with the other core countries -- France and Germany, and the United States in the classical period -- they attracted other countries to adopt the gold standard, in particular, British colonies and dominions, Western European countries, and Scandinavia. Other countries -- and, for some purposes, also British colonies and dominions -- were in the periphery: acted on, rather than actors, in the gold-standard eras, and generally not as committed to the gold standard.
a Including colonies (except British Honduras) and possessions without a national currency: New Zealand and certain other Oceanic colonies, South Africa, Guernsey, Jersey, Malta, Gibraltar, Cyprus, Bermuda, British West Indies, British Guiana, British Somaliland, Falkland Islands, other South and West African colonies. b Or perhaps 1798. c Including countries and territories with U.S. dollar as exclusive or predominant currency: British Honduras (from 1894), Cuba (from 1898), Dominican Republic (from 1901), Panama (from 1904), Puerto Rico (from 1900), Alaska, Aleutian Islands, Hawaii, Midway Islands (from 1898), Wake Island, Guam, and American Samoa. d Except August October 1914. e Including Tunisia (from 1891) and all other colonies except Indochina. f Including Newfoundland (from 1895). g Including British East Africa, Uganda, Zanzibar, Mauritius, and Ceylon (to 1901). h Including Montenegro (to 1911). I Including Belgian Congo. j Including Netherlands East Indies. k Including colonies, except Portuguese India. l Including Greenland and Iceland. m Or perhaps 1883. n Including Korea and Taiwan. o Including Borneo. p Approximate beginning date. Sources: Bloomfield (1959, pp. 13, 15; 1963), Bordo and Kydland (1995), Bordo and Schwartz (1996), Brown (1940, pp.15-16), Bureau of the Mint (1929), de Cecco (1984, p. 59), Ding (1967, pp. 6- 7), Director of the Mint (1913, 1917), Ford (1985, p. 153), Gallarotti (1995, pp. 272 75), Gunasekera (1962), Hawtrey (1950, p. 361), Hershlag (1980, p. 62), Ingram (1971, p. 153), Kemmerer (1916; 1940, pp. 9-10; 1944, p. 39), Kindleberger (1984, pp. 59-60), Lampe (1986, p. 34), MacKay (1946, p. 64), MacLeod (1994, p. 13), Norman (1892, pp. 83-84), Officer (1996, chs. 3 4), Pamuk (2000, p. 217), Powell (1999, p. 14), Rifaat (1935, pp. 47, 54), Shinjo (1962, pp. 81-83), Spalding (1928), Wallich (1950, pp. 32-36), Yeager (1976, p. 298), Young (1925).
a And freedom of gold export and import. b Including colonies (except British Honduras) and possessions without a national currency: Guernsey, Jersey, Malta, Gibraltar, Cyprus, Bermuda, British West Indies, British Guiana, British Somaliland, Falkland Islands, British West African and certain South African colonies, certain Oceanic colonies. cIncluding countries and territories with U.S. dollar as exclusive or predominant currency: British Honduras, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Panama, Puerto Rico, Alaska, Aleutian Islands, Hawaii, Midway Islands, Wake Island, Guam, and American Samoa. dNot applicable; "the United States dollar constituted the central point of reference in the whole post-war stabilization effort and was throughout the period of stabilization at par with gold." -- Brown (1940, p. 394) e1919 for freedom of gold export. f Including colonies and possessions, except Indochina and Syria. g Including Papua (New Guinea) and adjoining islands. h Kenya, Uganda, and Tanganyika. I Including Newfoundland. j Including Bhutan, Nepal, British Swaziland, Mauritius, Pemba Island, and Zanzibar. k 1925 for freedom of gold export. l Including Luxemburg and Belgian Congo. m Including Italian Somaliland and Tripoli. n Including Dutch Guiana and Curacao (Netherlands Antilles). o Including territories, except Portuguese India. p Including Liechtenstein. q Including Greenland and Iceland. r Including Greater Lebanon. s Including Korea and Taiwan. t Including Straits Settlements, Sarawak, Labuan, and Borneo. Sources: Bett (1957, p. 36), Brown (1940), Bureau of the Mint (1929), Ding (1967, pp. 6-7), Director of the Mint (1917), dos Santos (1996, pp. 191-92), Eichengreen (1992, p. 299), Federal Reserve Bulletin (1928, pp. 562, 847; 1929, pp. 201, 265, 549; 1930, pp. 72, 440; 1931, p. 554; 1935, p. 290; 1936, pp. 322, 760), Gunasekera (1962), Jonung (1984, p. 361), Kemmerer (1954, pp. 301 302), League of Nations (1926, pp. 7, 15; 1927, pp. 165-69; 1929, pp. 208-13; 1931, pp. 265-69; 1937/38, p. 107; 1946, p. 2), Moggridge (1989, p. 305), Officer (1996, chs. 3-4), Powell (1999, pp. 23-24), Spalding (1928), Wallich (1950, pp. 32-37), Yeager (1976, pp. 330, 344, 359); Young (1925, p. 76). Characteristics of Gold StandardsTypes of Gold StandardsPure Coin and Mixed Standards In theory, "domestic" gold standards -- those that do not depend on interaction with other countries -- are of two types: "pure coin" standard and "mixed" (meaning coin and paper, but also called simply "coin") standard. The two systems share several properties. (1) There is a well-defined and fixed gold content of the domestic monetary unit. For example, the dollar is defined as a specified weight of pure gold. (2) Gold coin circulates as money with unlimited legal-tender power (meaning it is a compulsorily acceptable means of payment of any amount in any transaction or obligation). (3) Privately owned bullion (gold in mass, foreign coin considered as mass, or gold in the form of bars) is convertible into gold coin in unlimited amounts at the government mint or at the central bank, and at the "mint price" (of gold, the inverse of the gold content of the monetary unit). (4) Private parties have no restriction on their holding or use of gold (except possibly that privately created coined money may be prohibited); in particular, they may melt coin into bullion. The effect is as if coin were sold to the monetary authority (central bank or Treasury acting as a central bank) for bullion. It would make sense for the authority to sell gold bars directly for coin, even though not legally required, thus saving the cost of coining. Conditions (3) and (4) commit the monetary authority in effect to transact in coin and bullion in each direction such that the mint price, or gold content of the monetary unit, governs in the marketplace. Under a pure coin standard, gold is the only money. Under a mixed standard, there are also paper currency (notes) -- issued by the government, central bank, or commercial banks -- and demand-deposit liabilities of banks. Government or central-bank notes (and central-bank deposit liabilities) are directly convertible into gold coin at the fixed established price on demand. Commercial-bank notes and demand deposits might be converted not directly into gold but rather into gold-convertible government or central-bank currency. This indirect convertibility of commercial-bank liabilities would apply certainly if the government or central- bank currency were legal tender but also generally even if it were not. As legal tender, gold coin is always exchangeable for paper currency or deposits at the mint price, and usually the monetary authority would provide gold bars for its coin. Again, two-way transactions in unlimited amounts fix the currency price of gold at the mint price. The credibility of the monetary-authority commitment to a fixed price of gold is the essence of a successful, ongoing gold-standard regime. A pure coin standard did not exist in any country during the gold-standard periods. Indeed, over time, gold coin declined from about one-fifth of the world money supply in 1800 (2/3 for gold and silver coin together, as silver was then the predominant monetary standard) to 17 percent in 1885 (1/3 for gold and silver, for an eleven-major-country aggregate), 10 percent in 1913 (15 percent for gold and silver, for the major-country aggregate), and essentially zero in 1928 for the major-country aggregate (Triffin, 1964, pp. 15, 56). See Table 3. The zero figure means not that gold coin did not exist, rather that its main use was as reserves for Treasuries, central banks, and (generally to a lesser extent) commercial banks.
a Core countries: Britain, United States, France, Germany. Western Europe: Belgium, Italy, Netherlands, Switzerland. Other countries: Canada, Japan, Sweden. b Metallic money, minor coin, paper currency, and demand deposits. c 1885: Gold and silver coin; overestimate, as includes commercial-bank holdings that could not be isolated from coin held outside banks by the public. 1913: Gold and silver coin. 1928: Gold coin. d Less than 0.5 percent. e 1885 and 1913: Gold, silver, and foreign exchange. 1928: Gold and foreign exchange. f Official gold: Gold in official reserves. Money gold: Gold-coin component of money supply. Sources: Triffin (1964, p. 62), Sayers (1976, pp. 348, 352) for 1928 Bank of England dollar reserves (dated January 2, 1929). An "international" gold standard, which naturally requires that more than one country be on gold, requires in addition freedom both of international gold flows (private parties are permitted to import or export gold without restriction) and of foreign-exchange transactions (an absence of exchange control). Then the fixed mint prices of any two countries on the gold standard imply a fixed exchange rate ("mint parity") between the countries' currencies. For example, the dollar- sterling mint parity was $4.8665635 per pound sterling (the British pound). Gold-Bullion and Gold-Exchange StandardsIn principle, a country can choose among four kinds of international gold standards -- the pure coin and mixed standards, already mentioned, a gold-bullion standard, and a gold- exchange standard. Under a gold-bullion standard, gold coin neither circulates as money nor is it used as commercial-bank reserves, and the government does not coin gold. The monetary authority (Treasury or central bank) stands ready to transact with private parties, buying or selling gold bars (usable only for import or export, not as domestic currency) for its notes, and generally a minimum size of transaction is specified. For example, in 1925 1931 the Bank of England was on the bullion standard and would sell gold bars only in the minimum amount of 400 fine (pure) ounces, approximately £1699 or $8269. Finally, the monetary authority of a country on a gold-exchange standard buys and sells not gold in any form but rather gold- convertible foreign exchange, that is, the currency of a country that itself is on the gold coin or bullion standard. Gold Points and Gold Export/ImportA fixed exchange rate (the mint parity) for two countries on the gold standard is an oversimplification that is often made but is misleading. There are costs of importing or exporting gold. These costs include freight, insurance, handling (packing and cartage), interest on money committed to the transaction, risk premium (compensation for risk), normal profit, any deviation of purchase or sale price from the mint price, possibly mint charges, and possibly abrasion (wearing out or removal of gold content of coin -- should the coin be sold abroad by weight or as bullion). Expressing the exporting costs as the percent of the amount invested (or, equivalently, as percent of parity), the product of 1/100th of these costs and mint parity (the number of units of domestic currency per unit of foreign currency) is added to mint parity to obtain the gold-export point -- the exchange rate at which gold is exported. To obtain the gold-import point, the product of 1/100th of the importing costs and mint parity is subtracted from mint parity. If the exchange rate is greater than the gold-export point, private-sector "gold-point arbitrageurs" export gold, thereby obtaining foreign currency. Conversely, for the exchange rate less than the gold-import point, gold is imported and foreign currency relinquished. Usually the gold is, directly or indirectly, purchased from the monetary authority of the one country and sold to the monetary authority in the other. The domestic-currency cost of the transaction per unit of foreign currency obtained is the gold-export point. That per unit of foreign currency sold is the gold-import point. Also, foreign currency is sold, or purchased, at the exchange rate. Therefore arbitrageurs receive a profit proportional to the exchange-rate/gold-point divergence. Gold-Point ArbitrageHowever, the arbitrageurs' supply of foreign currency eliminates profit by returning the exchange rate to below the gold-export point. Therefore perfect "gold-point arbitrage" would ensure that the exchange rate has upper limit of the gold-export point. Similarly, the arbitrageurs' demand for foreign currency returns the exchange rate to above the gold-import point, and perfect arbitrage ensures that the exchange rate has that point as a lower limit. It is important to note what induces the private sector to engage in gold-point arbitrage: (1) the profit motive; and (2) the credibility of the commitment to (a) the fixed gold price and (b) freedom of foreign exchange and gold transactions, on the part of the monetary authorities of both countries. Gold-Point SpreadThe difference between the gold points is called the (gold-point) spread. The gold points and the spread may be expressed as percentages of parity. Estimates of gold points and spreads involving center countries are provided for the classical and interwar gold standards in Tables 4 and 5. Noteworthy is that the spread for a given country pair generally declines over time both over the classical gold standard (evidenced by the dollar-sterling figures) and for the interwar compared to the classical period.
a For numerator country. b Gold-import point for denominator country. c Gold-export point for denominator country. d Gold-export point plus gold-import point. e Denmark, Sweden, and Norway. Method of Computation: PA = period average. MED = median exchange rate form estimate of various authorities for various dates, converted to percent deviation from parity. SE = single exchange-rate- form estimate, converted to percent deviation from parity. Sources: U.S./Britain -- Officer (1996, p. 174). France/U.S., Germany/U.S., France/Britain, Germany/Britain, Germany/France -- Morgenstern (1959, pp. 178-81). Austria/Britain, Netherlands/Britain, Scandinavia/Britain -- Easton (1912, pp. 358-63).
a For numerator country. b Gold-import point for denominator country. c Gold-export point for denominator country. d Gold-export point plus gold-import point. e To end of June 1928. French-franc exchange-rate stabilization, but absence of currency convertibility; see Table 2. f Beginning July 1928. French-franc convertibility; see Table 2. Method of Computation: PA = period average. MED = median exchange rate form estimate of various authorities for various dates, converted to percent deviation from parity. SE = single exchange-rate- form estimate, converted to percent deviation from parity. Sources: U.S./Britain -- Officer (1996, p. 174). U.S./France, U.S./Germany, France/Britain 1929- 1933, Germany/Britain -- Morgenstern (1959, pp. 185-87). Canada/Britain, Netherlands/Britain -- Einzig (1929, pp. 98-101) [Netherlands/Britain currencies' mint parity from Spalding (1928, p. 135). France/Britain 1926, Denmark/Britain, Norway/Britain, Sweden/Britain -- Spalding (1926, pp. 429-30, 436). The effective monetary standard of a country is distinguishable from its legal standard. For example, a country legally on bimetallism usually is effectively on either a gold or silver monometallic standard, depending on whether its "mint-price ratio" (the ratio of its mint price of gold to mint price of silver) is greater or less than the world price ratio. In contrast, a country might be legally on a gold standard but its banks (and government) have "suspended specie (gold) payments" (refusing to convert their notes into gold), so that the country is in fact on a "paper standard." The criterion adopted here is that a country is deemed on the gold standard if (1) gold is the predominant effective metallic money, or is the monetary bullion, (2) specie payments are in force, and (3) there is a limitation on the coinage and/or the legal-tender status of silver (the only practical and historical competitor to gold), thus providing institutional or legal support for the effective gold standard emanating from (1) and (2). Implications for Money SupplyConsider first the domestic gold standard. Under a pure coin standard, the gold in circulation, monetary base, and money supply are all one. With a mixed standard, the money supply is the product of the money multiplier (dependent on the commercial-banks' reserves/deposit and the nonbank-public's currency/deposit ratios) and the monetary base (the actual and potential reserves of the commercial banking system, with potential reserves held by the nonbank public). The monetary authority alters the monetary base by changing its gold holdings and its loans, discounts, and securities portfolio (non gold assets, called its "domestic assets"). However, the level of its domestic assets is dependent on its gold reserves, because the authority generates demand liabilities (notes and deposits) by increasing its assets, and convertibility of these liabilities must be supported by a gold reserve, if the gold standard is to be maintained. Therefore the gold standard provides a constraint on the level (or growth) of the money supply. The international gold standard involves balance-of-payments surpluses settled by gold imports at the gold-import point, and deficits financed by gold exports at the gold-export point. (Within the spread, there are no gold flows and the balance of payments is in equilibrium.) The change in the money supply is then the product of the money multiplier and the gold flow, providing the monetary authority does not change its domestic assets. For a country on a gold- exchange standard, holdings of "foreign exchange" (the reserve currency) take the place of gold. In general, the "international assets" of a monetary authority may consist of both gold and foreign exchange. The Classical Gold StandardDates of Countries Joining the Gold StandardTable 1 (above) lists all countries that were on the classical gold standard, the gold- standard type to which each adhered, and the period(s) on the standard. Discussion here concentrates on the four core countries. For centuries, Britain was on an effective silver standard under legal bimetallism. The country switched to an effective gold standard early in the eighteenth century, solidified by the (mistakenly) gold-overvalued mint-price ratio established by Isaac Newton, Master of the Mint, in 1717. In 1774 the legal-tender property of silver was restricted, and Britain entered the gold standard in the full sense on that date. In 1798 coining of silver was suspended, and in 1816 the gold standard was formally adopted, ironically during a paper-standard regime (the "Bank Restriction Period," of 1797-1821), with the gold standard effectively resuming in 1821. The United States was on an effective silver standard dating back to colonial times, legally bimetallic from 1786, and on an effective gold standard from 1834. The legal gold standard began in 1873-1874, when Acts ended silver-dollar coinage and limited legal tender of existing silver coins. Ironically, again the move from formal bimetallism to a legal gold standard occurred during a paper standard (the "greenback period," of 1861-1878), with a dual legal and effective gold standard from 1879. International Shift to the Gold StandardThe rush to the gold standard occurred in the 1870s, with the adherence of Germany, the Scandinavian countries, France, and other European countries. Legal bimetallism shifted from effective silver to effective gold monometallism around 1850, as gold discoveries in the United States and Australia resulted in overvalued gold at the mints. The gold/silver market situation subsequently reversed itself, and, to avoid a huge inflow of silver, many European countries suspended the coinage of silver and limited its legal-tender property. Some countries (France, Belgium, Switzerland) adopted a "limping" gold standard, in which existing former-standard silver coin retained full legal tender, permitting the monetary authority to redeem its notes in silver as well as gold. As Table 1 shows, most countries were on a gold-coin (always meaning mixed) standard. The gold-bullion standard did not exist in the classical period (although in Britain that standard was embedded in legislation of 1819 that established a transition to restoration of the gold standard). A number of countries in the periphery were on a gold-exchange standard, usually because they were colonies or territories of a country on a gold-coin standard. In situations in which the periphery country lacked its own (even-coined) currency, the gold-exchange standard existed almost by default. Some countries -- China, Persia, parts of Latin America -- never joined the classical gold standard, instead retaining their silver or bimetallic standards. Sources of Instability of the Classical Gold StandardThere were three elements making for instability of the classical gold standard. First, the use of foreign exchange as reserves increased as the gold standard progressed. Available end-of- year data indicate that, worldwide, foreign exchange in official reserves (the international assets of the monetary authority) increased by 36 percent from 1880 to 1899 and by 356 percent from 1899 to 1913. In comparison, gold in official reserves increased by 160 percent from 1880 to 1903 but only by 88 percent from 1903 to 1913. (Lindert, 1969, pp. 22, 25) While in 1913 only Germany among the center countries held any measurable amount of foreign exchange -- 15 percent of total reserves excluding silver (which was of limited use) -- the percentage for the rest of the world was double that for Germany (Table 6). If there were a rush to cash in foreign exchange for gold, reduction or depletion of the gold of reserve-currency countries could place the gold standard in jeopardy.
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