by Alexander W. Salter
The American Institute for Economic Research
Dr. Judy Shelton, one of President Trump’s nominees to the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors, recently passed a Senate committee vote and is currently waiting to be confirmed by the full Senate. She has drawn scathing criticism from the commentariat, mostly due to her positive view of the gold standard. Shelton’s detractors have published several attacks on the gold standard in recent weeks. Steven Rattner, a counselor to President Obama’s Treasury secretary, writes that the gold standard is “a long-abandoned approach” and that a Fed official supporting it “would be akin to a Supreme Court justice embracing the Code of Hammurabi.” David Wilcox, a former research director at the Federal Reserve Board, lambasts the gold standard as an “outmoded approach to setting monetary conditions.” The Los Angeles Times editorial staff complains that the “gold standard is the antithesis of modern monetary policy.” The experts are unanimous: supporting the gold standard is tantamount to monetary quackery.