‘I think people want to see their earnings and property be reflected in real money again,’ Utah State Rep. Ken Ivory stated.
Those who seethe as their dollars lose value to inflation may be pleased to know that many states are now working to pass laws that would allow gold and silver to be used—not only for savings and investment but as everyday currency for purchases and payments as well.
The state of Utah took a major step last week toward the use of gold and silver as transactional currencies, allowing their use for state payments to vendors. A bill, sponsored by state Rep. Ken Ivory, passed the Utah state legislature on March 18 and is now awaiting the signature of Gov. Spencer Cox.
If signed, this bill would make Utah the first state in America to pass a “transactional gold” bill.
“This is about making sure that people have choices,” Ivory told The Epoch Times. “It’s important that we give people a choice in how they store and transact their earnings and their savings.”
For Utah residents, the bill also addressed issues of local autonomy and preservation of savings, he said.
“We express our liberty and our work and our property in something called money, but where the dollar used to be money, now it’s just currency,” he said. “I think people want to see their earnings and property be reflected in real money again.”
Money functions as a medium of exchange, a unit of account, and a store of value. But the dollar has struggled to hold its value since it was delinked from gold.
“One of the key elements of precious metals is the ability to hopefully retain purchasing power of your money, and so if the dollar is being eroded by inflation, precious metals have typically been able to preserve purchasing power better than the fiat currency,” Utah state treasurer Marlo Oaks told The Epoch Times.
A Growing Movement to Use Gold as Money
State lawmakers believe they are on firm legal footing in establishing an alternative legal tender. While the U.S. Constitution gives the federal government the exclusive right to “coin money,” it also permits states to make “gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts.”
