The reason why Chongzhen Emperor Zhu Youzhen longed for the Ming Dynasty to be able to transition from the silver standard to the gold standard in an extreme period of time is because of the current world environment, and the current Ming Empire is actually in a gap that is very conducive to the development of the Ming Dynasty and even to China!

The germ of capitalism in the Ming Dynasty is not more backward than that of Europe, and the world's war for overseas hegemony has not formed the mainstream, and everything is only in the bud!

If you want to be more proactive in foreign trade, Chongzhen Emperor Zhu Youzhen only needs to do a few things, the first is to fight! It is an indisputable fact that force is the ultimate royal road of diplomacy!

This point, the Chongzhen Emperor Zhu Youzhen, who has seen all the vicissitudes of history, knows it better than anyone else!

But in the case of the superiority of force, it is necessary to start thinking about money and commodities!

Emperor Zhu Youzhen studied medicine for a period of time in modern times, learned modern medicine, and the 'special' pharmaceutical technology, all of which were actively prepared for the rapid entry of goods into the world market!

In two hundred years, if China follows history, China will be blasted open by the world powers, the 'special' pharmaceutical technology and foreign guns and cannons! Caught in a situation from which there is no return!

Although Emperor Chongzhen Zhu Youzhen was very unaccustomed to the 'special' pharmaceutical technology, he had to admit that it was a sharp weapon!

Under the gold standard, the exchange rate is fixed, which eliminates the uncertainty of exchange rate fluctuations and is conducive to world trade; Central banks have a fixed price of gold, so that the real value of the currency is stable; No country has a privileged position.

At the same time, however, the gold standard limits the ability of monetary policy to meet domestic equilibrium targets. Only the currency pegged to gold can guarantee price stability; The money supply is limited by the amount of gold. inability to meet the needs of economic growth; Gold production cannot sustainably meet demand. Central banks are unable to increase their international reserves; When a country has a balance of payments deficit, it may often cause production stagnation and worker unemployment due to gold export and monetary tightening; There is a lot of economic pressure on gold exporting countries.

The base currency, also known as the main currency, is the basic currency and legal denominated settlement currency of a country. The so-called basic currency refers to the standard unit of valuation of a country. Under the metal money system, the standard currency can be minted freely. Under the paper money regime. The standard currency is issued by the state monopoly. The base currency has unlimited solvency.

The base currency can be understood as the base currency, and the currency is actually a universal commodity, so the base currency is a benchmark for measuring the general currency or a qiē commodity. The gold standard, for example, uses gold, a metal, as a benchmark to measure the value of commodities. China's current standard currency is "RMB", and in the past, the standard currency of almost all civilizations was "gold" and "silver".

The reason for using gold and silver as the standard currency may have been due to the rarity and beauty of these two metals. It stands to reason that gold and silver are relatively rare metals in the final analysis, and at most they can be regarded as symbols of wealth, and no matter how high the meaning is, they are just metals. On the other hand, it is not necessary to use them as the base currency. We can also use copper, iron, and paper money as the standard currency. But in economics. Gold and silver have a very special meaning.

It's understandable to use paper money as the standard currency, but the biggest problem with paper money is that it can be printed indiscriminately. The issuance of money must be regulated, and the indiscriminate issuance of money can lead to inflation, for the reasons we have already mentioned. Gold and silver as the standard currency have two advantages that no other material can replace, that is, they are scarce and accepted by all civilizations. Scarcity determines that gold and silver are not easily overused, while "acceptable to all civilizations" determines the wide circulation of gold and silver. All currencies, whether pound sterling, US dollars, or renminbi, can be pegged to gold and silver, and the ratio of the exchange rate can be determined steadily. This is also the general framework of world economics for a long time in the past.

The gold standard refers to a monetary system in which gold is used as the standard currency. Its main forms are the gold coin standard, the gold bullion standard and the gold exchange standard.

The gold coin standard is a typical gold standard in which gold is used as a monetary metal. Its main features are: gold coins can be freely minted and melted freely; Coins and value symbols in circulation (e.g. bank notes) can be freely exchanged for huàn gold coins; Gold can be freely exported and imported. Between countries on the gold standard, the exchange rate is calculated based on the gold content of the two currencies, known as gold parity.

The bullion standard refers to the monetary system in which paper money issued by the central bank and prepared for gold bullion is circulated. The difference between it and the gold coin standard is that: first, the gold bar standard uses paper money or bank notes as the circulating currency, and no longer mints and circulates gold coins, but stipulates the gold content of paper money or bank notes, and paper money or bank notes can be exchanged for gold; Second, the government is required to concentrate gold reserves and allow residents to exchange huàn gold bullion when the gold content of the standard currency reaches a certain amount.

The gold exchange standard refers to a monetary system in which bank bills are used as the currency in circulation and foreign exchange is indirectly exchanged for gold. The gold exchange standard is the same as the gold bar standard in that the gold content of the monetary unit is specified, and the bank bills are circulated domestically, and there is no coinage circulation. However, it is stipulated that bank bills can be exchanged for foreign exchange, but cannot be exchanged for huàn gold. The country's central bank deposited gold and foreign exchange in another country that was on the gold standard, allowed foreign exchange to be exchanged indirectly for gold, and set a legal ratio between the national currency and the national currency, thereby stabilizing the value of the local currency.

Governments pegged their currencies to the U.S. dollar to set a huàn ratio, which indirectly pegged their currencies to gold. In this international monetary arrangement, the U.S. dollar is in a key position to be gold-equivalent relative to the currencies of other member countries. Therefore, this system is also called the international monetary system centered on the US dollar.

The silver standard refers to a monetary system in which silver is used as the standard currency. In the evolution of the monetary system, the silver standard predates the gold standard. The silver standard works similarly to the gold standard, with the main difference being that silver is used as the standard currency. Silver coins have unlimited solvency, and their nominal value is equal to the value of the silver they actually contain. The silver standard was divided into two silver standards and a silver coin standard.

The double standard system refers to the fact that a country stipulates that both gold and silver are the standard currencies. Under the double standard, both gold and silver were free to be bought and sold, freely minted and melted, and freely exported and imported, as under the gold standard or silver standard.

On the surface, the double standard system can make the standard money metal have a more sufficient source and the quantity of money can better meet the needs of the expanding production and exchange of commodities, but in fact it is a monetary system with inherent instability.

The phenomenon of "bad money driving out good money", that is, when the market value of gold and silver is higher than the officially determined price of the two metals is constantly collected, the "precious" metals of gold and silver will eventually be withdrawn from circulation, making the double standard system impossible to realize. This phenomenon is known as "Gresham's Law". The fundamental reason for "bad money driving out good money" lies in the contradiction between the gold and silver standard and the exclusivity and exclusivity of money as a general equivalent.

1. The banknote standard, also known as the credit standard, is no longer required to use metal currency as a preparation for issuance due to national laws.

2. The main feature of the paper money system is that it is paper money and bank deposits that perform monetary functions in circulation.

3. Paper money creates conditions for the government to regulate the amount of money and affect economic activities.

4. There are different arguments about the paper money system since the day it was implemented.

Proponents of the gold standard argued that only by making money convertible into gold could the government's rash behavior be restrained from a material basis and that the government should be cautious. Those who favor the paper money standard argue that in today's economy and society, changes in the money supply have a wide impact on the economy, and that the government has become an indispensable part of economic policy by changing the money supply to achieve predetermined economic goals.

Is there anything wrong with using a material form other than gold and silver as the standard currency? For example, our country's current form of using the renminbi as the standard currency? Theoretically, there is nothing wrong with it, but in practice there is a problem. (To be continued......)