by Keith Weiner
GoldSeek
There is an old rhyme once used in economics books.
“Money is a matter of functions four: a medium, a measure, a standard and a store.”
Three of these functions are clear.
A medium of exchange is what people use to pay for goods.
A measure means that money is a way of measuring economic value: the unit of account. Suppose a business has 100 units of money worth of assets at the start of the year. At the end of the year, it has 110 units. It has earned a profit of 10 units. Of course, this calculation is only meaningful if money measures value accurately.
Storing value is the flip side of this same coin. If someone holds 100 units of money for a year—or ten years—he should have the same amount of value at the end.