[3] 'Did the US Treasury Manipulate the Gold Price Down' dated 1st August 2006 and a follow up article on 30th August titled 'The How and Why of Gold Price Manipulation' both by Greg Peel in FN Arena News; Commodities [4] The Economist, 17th August 2006 'A spectre haunting India' explained this Mao-movement of terrorism as 'A primitive peasant rebellion based on an outmoded ideology is out of keeping with the modern India of soaring growth, Bollywood dreams and call-centres... it covered 170 of India's 602 districts... and one-quarter of Indian land-mass' [5] 'The so-called "free trade" bottom line: Poor countries producing commodities cannot possibly compete against rich countries producing credit money. Yet they are being forced to do so. Meanwhile, during the past 30 years the US has bombed or attacked Syria, Lebanon, Nicaragua, Sudan, Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Iraq, Guatemala, Japan, East Timor, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Somalia, Haiti, Yugoslavia, and Panama. The common denominator of these nations is that they are all non-members of the World Trade Organization. Since the invention of the WTO only Japan has joined willingly; the South American countries have been "persuaded" by friends of the system.' From 'Money', Library of Halexandria, http://www.halexandria.org/dward299.htm And how much unsustainable this whole economy is understandable when agriculture in rich countries with all modern amenities is economically not feasible against agriculture in poor countries using age-old technology and labour. Rich countries (US & EU) continue providing substantial subsidy in farm products which was one contention of developing nations in the recently concluded Geneva round of WTO where discussions finally broke down.
The interesting thing about gold is its value as a measure of purchasing power. An ounce of gold has throughout history been about the same value as a very good man's suit (today roughly $625). Looked at another way, it tells you what a dollar is worth. As the dollar rises in value, the price of gold falls.
Unfortunately I could not find a way to put a graph into these remarks, so I'll just have to describe a graph I made recently. From 1990 to today the price of gold has risen from about $400 to about $625. That's a 56% increase in the price of gold which is equivalent to about a 36% decrease in the value of the dollars you are lucky enough to be hording in you savings account.
Since you can's see the graph let me tell you that 1990 showed a decline, but when Clinton took office in 1992 gold made a jump up from $333 to $391 and then stayed fairly steady through 1996. It fell to around $290 in 1997 and stayed there (roughly) until 2001 until Bush took office. Remember that a decline in the price of gold means that the money you have in the bank is worth more. Overall the the price of gold declined from 1992 through 2000.
However, the price of gold has been increasing during the Bush reign, rising from about $290 to a recent price of $637. That means that the money you have in the bank is worth 54% less today than it was when Bush took office. Of course you have been earning 1%-2% interest on that money, so you have perhaps as many as 12% more dollars now.
by
PrMaine (10 articles, 8 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 335 comments)
on Friday, September 8, 2006 at 7:22:54 PM
1 comments
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