Mar 28 2006
Greenspan: Defender of Gold-Backed Dollars
- “Greenspan had recommended to a Senate committee that all economic regulations should have fixed lifespans. Senator Paul Sarbanes (D-Md.) accused him of “playing with fire, or indeed throwing gasoline on the fire,” and asked him whether he favored a similar provision in the Fed’s authorization.
Greenspan coolly answered that he did.
Do you actually mean, demanded the senator, that the Fed “should cease to function unless affirmatively continued?”
“That is correct, sir,” Greenspan responded.
“All right,” the senator came back, “the Defense Department?”
“Yes.”
The Senator could scarcely believe his ears. “Now my next question is, is it your intention that the report of this hearing should be that Greenspan recommends a return to the gold standard?”
Greenspan responded, “I’ve been recommending that for years, there’s nothing new about that. It would probably mean there is only one vote in the Federal Open Market Committee for that, but it is mine.”
— From Bill Bradford’s “Alan Greenspan and Ayn Rand” published around 1997.
