The Fiat Standard
at the time of publication
In The Fiat Standard, world-renowned economist Saifedean Ammous applies his unique analytical lens to the fiat monetary system
Fiat money is a government-issued currency that is not backed by a physical commodity but rather by the government that issued it.Learn more, explaining it as a feat of engineering and technology just as he did for bitcoin in his global bestseller The Bitcoin Standard.
This time, Ammous delves into the world’s earlier shift from the gold standard to today’s system of government-backed fiat money—outlining the fiat standard’s purposes and failures; deriving the wider economic, political, and social implications of its use; and examining how BitcoinBitcoin1$ 67,714.930.18%-6.01%-15.89%details will affect it over time.
With penetrating insight, Ammous analyzes global political currencies by analogy to bitcoin: how they’re “mined
Bitcoin mining is the process by which new bitcoins are entered into circulation.Learn more” whenever government-guaranteed entities create loans, their lack of inherent restraints on inflation, and the rampant government intervention that has resulted in heavy, devastating, and persistent distortions to global markets for food, fuel, science, and education.
Through these comparisons, Ammous demonstrates that bitcoin
Bitcoin is a decentralized digital currency that can be sent from user to user on the peer-to-peer bitcoin network without the need for intermediaries.Learn more could be our next step forward—providing high salability across space, just like the fiat system, but without the unchecked fiat-denominated debt. Rather than a messy hyperinflationary collapse
Hyperinflation is a term to describe rapid, excessive, and out-of-control general price increases in an economy.Learn more, the rise of bitcoin could look like a debt jubilee and an orderly upgrade to the world’s monetary operating system, revolutionizing global capital and energy markets.
Featured Review
If you want to understand how the economy works, read the Bitcoin Standard, then the Fiat Standard.
Almost all Americans are completely ignorant about the functioning of our economy. If you are concerned about your financial future, you need to educate yourself about the alternative to dollar inflation. Having read numerous books and articles about bitcoin, I find these two volumes of Saifedean Ammous’ work are the most comprehensive. Reading them sequentially will peel away the mystery and you will see clearly what has been happening before our eyes and behind the scenes for several hundred years until the present day. Then you will be able to separate yourself from the crowd and make decisions that will most effectively protect and enhance the life of you and your progeny. If only for their sake, please don’t pass this opportunity by.