What I was wondering, while listening to the podcast, was whether gold would make the best commodity for the purpose of a monetary standard going forward. In the past, when people discovered new gold fields, that had a slightly inflationary impact. So when the California gold fields were discovered in 1849, they caused inflation of around 1-2% per annum for the next decade. That seems low by modern standards but was almost shocking at the time. But suppose someone discovers an asteroid full of gold in the future? That would cause a problem. Look at the historical case study of the devastating impact of the discovery of South American silver mines on the economy and economic development of Spain: The inflow of new silver simply led to inflation. Lawrence says in the podcast that he’s using “gold standard” as a shorthand, but other commodities would do just as well. Any suggestions?

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