The Death of Money: Q&A With James Rickards

Original release date was December 18, 2010 and original writeup is below.

"Everything that was 'too big to fail' in 2008 is bigger and more dangerous today," says New York Times bestselling author James Rickards. Rickards predicts the crash of the global currency market and insolvency of the U.S. dollar in his latest book, The Death of Money: The Coming Collapse of the International Monetary System. "We're waiting for the catalyst that will cause this catastrophe to come tumbling down." 

Reason Managing Editor Katherine Mangu-Ward sat down with Rickards to discuss the future of money and a return to the financial stability of the gold standard in an event co-hosted by the Charles Koch Institute.

About 30 minutes.

Cameras by Amanda Winkler and Joshua Swain. Edited by Swain.

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Comments

[Palin's Buttplug]

"We're waiting for the catalyst that will cause this catastrophe to come tumbling down."

If you don't know what that catalyst is you don't have much of a theory.

[Corning]

So with no Enron then the dot com bubble would have kept growing?

Can we blame California Dems in the 90s for our shitty economy then?

[drugwarisevil]

The audio quality on this video is very troubling for folks like myself with poor hearing. I can hear Katherine really well but it's much harder to hear him.

[Virginian]

The gods of the copybook headings say "Never put all your eggs in one basket"

[Agammamon]

Oh dear. I need some Mint-X rodent repellent trashbags ASAP!

[Agammamon]

You know - this wouldn't be much of an issue if we didn't make it so damn hard to diversify your portfolio with investments in stuff *outside* our economy.

That's sort of the point, its why a global food supply is better able to weather disasters - a bad harvest locally can be made up with imports.

[Palin's Buttplug]

His remedies:

1- ban derivatives
2- break up big banks
3- bring back Glass-Steagall

[Jordan]

Window dressing. End the Fed.

[Palin's Buttplug]

He mentions that possibility. He says the IMF would then replace the Fed and SDRs would replace the USD.

[Corning]

USD would become a local currency like the Peso he said.

Sounds good to me...

Seen the price of bitcoin lately?

[Corning]

3- bring back Glass-Steagall

Meh.

How about we just let banks that are consumer/investment banks go broke when they fuck up.

You know like how the house republicans voted the first time to do.

and take away their FDIC status if they want to be investment banks.

Sure a bank that does investments and has consumer branches has risks...but why make it illegal. Let the market price those risks rather then socializing them in the first place.

[Dweebston]

You can't ferret out innovative controls on capital and exchange if you simply let bad actors bankrupt themselves.

No, much better to erect a labyrinth of patronage and political payoff than to level the legal constraints and let markets price risk accordingly.

[Cytotoxic]

Canada never had a full equivalent to Glass-Steagal and it knocked down the closest thing to it in the '80s. Our banks are doing great thanks for asking it's because there is less regulation of them thanks for asking.

[Dweebston]

Well, what do you expect? They're Canadian.

[The Late P Brooks]

"We're waiting for the catalyst that will cause this catastrophe to come tumbling down."

With Wise Old Janet Yellin manning the bulwark? Not likely.

FULL STEAM AHEAD.

DAMN THE TORPEDOES!

[Corning]

Centralization of credit in the banks of the state, by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly.

- Karl Marx

[mickeyg]

Good luck buying back all the gold; the Chinese have acquired massive stockpiles.