Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you should Know from house stuff Works
Speaker 1: dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark,
Speaker 1: and I'm with Charles W Chuck, Bryan, he's right here
Speaker 1: with me. So it's stuff you should know. It's also
Speaker 1: really stuff you should know because Jerry's here too. Oh
Speaker 1: the chairs not here. It's fake stuff you should know.
Speaker 1: It's less than vintage stuff you should know. Got you.
Speaker 1: I mean it's not bad. Yeah, it's not great. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm sure Matt and everyone appreciate that. N listen to
Speaker 1: this crap? Yeah, Chuck, Yes, how much money do you
Speaker 1: have on you right now? Cash? Zero dollars and zero cents? Well,
Speaker 1: that's stupid, because you should have thirty eight in cash
Speaker 1: on you. I never have cash. Well, you should almost
Speaker 1: never have cash. You should have thirty eight hundred dollars
Speaker 1: in cash on you right now. So should I? So
Speaker 1: should Jerry. Um, but we don't. We don't. It's sad
Speaker 1: I in my pocket. Okay, Well, let's let's explain why
Speaker 1: I just said that. Huh was I supposed to? That's
Speaker 1: all right, I'll do it. Um, I can do it.
Speaker 1: That's how much if you divide up all the money
Speaker 1: between all the Americans. That's how much we should all have. Bam, bam.
Speaker 1: So we're trying to answer a question here, how much
Speaker 1: money is there in the world. Um, And we'll get
Speaker 1: to that. There's a there's actually a rough estimate out
Speaker 1: there that may be right. But instead, first let's talk
Speaker 1: about how much American money there is in the world.
Speaker 1: And not just because we're American, but because it is
Speaker 1: the standard currency worldwide. It's the closest thing to the
Speaker 1: universal currency that we have, um, the dollar, the green bag. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but um, that's not, as I guess, um, widespread as
Speaker 1: it once was. A lot of people have abandoned the dollar,
Speaker 1: um and now use a basket of currencies to value
Speaker 1: their currency against very rebellious Um. But still the dollar
Speaker 1: is generally what's you to say for oil speculation? And
Speaker 1: imagine the dollars in that basket too though right, maybe
Speaker 1: maybe not, It depends on how much they hate America. So, UM,
Speaker 1: what you were talking about though, was all the money
Speaker 1: divided up by all the Americans coming up to thirty
Speaker 1: eight dollars. That's called the M zero money supply. Of course,
Speaker 1: you know how I read that m O. The more
Speaker 1: money supply. I was like, what and then I read
Speaker 1: I read it again. I said, it can't be called
Speaker 1: the more money Supply, and then I realized that was
Speaker 1: a zero and not an O. It uh, it looks
Speaker 1: very much like the more money Supply. I wrote this article.
Speaker 1: I realized it, and I never saw it like that
Speaker 1: until you just said that. Yeah, I like the more
Speaker 1: money supply better than the M O. It's good, but
Speaker 1: it is M O for a reason. There's also the
Speaker 1: M one, M two, and there wasn't M three, which
Speaker 1: we'll get to, right. And the people who came up
Speaker 1: with this was the Federal Reserve Bank, the United States
Speaker 1: Central Bank, right, And they like to track money. That's
Speaker 1: one of the things they do to amuse themselves. Count yeah,
Speaker 1: count money, um, and go to sleep on piles of
Speaker 1: gold ingots. But the Fed came up with this M
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, this MO money supply, also known as the
Speaker 1: M zero supply, and that is all of the bills
Speaker 1: and coins, all of the actual hard currency that exists
Speaker 1: in the world anywhere in US dollars and as of
Speaker 1: July two thirteen, Hey, that's recent. Yeah, that came to
Speaker 1: a we should say. Catherine Whitbourne from the Coolest Stuff
Speaker 1: on the Planet update. She updated this, so the fact
Speaker 1: that this is as up today as it is thanks
Speaker 1: to her um but the the m so the more
Speaker 1: money supply as of July two Thousteen is one point
Speaker 1: to trillion dollars. That's all the cash and all the
Speaker 1: coins all over the world of American dollars, the real
Speaker 1: dollars that you can collect and put together you can
Speaker 1: light your cigars with, yeah, or you can throw into
Speaker 1: a fountain. Yeah. One point to trillion US dollars. So
Speaker 1: that's how much money was in the world. But and
Speaker 1: and we said, also, that's thirty eight hundred for every
Speaker 1: American man, woman, and child, all three hundred and sixteen million,
Speaker 1: six hundred and sixty eight thousand, five hundred and sixty
Speaker 1: seven Americans that were alive in July of two thousand thirteen,
Speaker 1: each one should have had thirty eight hundred bucks in
Speaker 1: their pocket. Because we're not talking checking accounts, we're talking
Speaker 1: in the actual currency that people are walking around with.
Speaker 1: Since I don't have thirty eight hundred dollars in my
Speaker 1: pocket and I didn't in July, you don't, Jerry, No,
Speaker 1: Jerry's got more. Where is this stuff. That's a good question.
Speaker 1: I wonder how that clock ticks, by the way, the
Speaker 1: population clock. I'd like to see a real time like
Speaker 1: three people died, four people born, people died, eight people born,
Speaker 1: said its wins. I wonder if it ever does go
Speaker 1: backwards for a second. It's got too because people are dying,
Speaker 1: but more people are being born than people are dying. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it depends on the country you're talking about. Yeah, that's true. Um.
Speaker 1: I always drive by the one in Atlanta, you know,
Speaker 1: on the population clock that's been there forever. When I
Speaker 1: was a kid, I remember when the top two million
Speaker 1: it was like whoa, and now it's whatever three points something,
Speaker 1: is it? Yeah? I mean that's metro Atlanta, right, it's
Speaker 1: not city of Atlanta. Um, alright, So back to it. Uh,
Speaker 1: where were we hard to track the more money? No,
Speaker 1: we were talking about where the thirty eight hundred bucks
Speaker 1: that should be in our pockets is. Oh well, um,
Speaker 1: about a half to two thirds of that is overseas.
Speaker 1: It's an overseas pockets, that's right, or overseas bank account sir. No, No,
Speaker 1: we're not talking bank accountants. That's just money, that's right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So that means that there are people walking around overseas
Speaker 1: with cash on them American dollar, American dollars, which makes
Speaker 1: a lot of sense. And so when you start to
Speaker 1: divide the amount of money at one point two trillion
Speaker 1: buy a lot more than three and sixteen million people.
Speaker 1: That explains why I have a single dollar bill on
Speaker 1: my person right now, why I have nothing? Right and
Speaker 1: Jerry nothing nothing man, We're sad sex Okay, So that's
Speaker 1: just the MO money supply. Yeah, the M zero. The
Speaker 1: M one is all of the more money plus checking
Speaker 1: account money and other kinds of just accounts that you
Speaker 1: can you know, track and travelers checks. Yeah, very very
Speaker 1: liquid types of accounts. Yes, that's the M one. Yeah
Speaker 1: supply that And it's funny that you were having trouble
Speaker 1: wrapping your head around the fact that we were talking
Speaker 1: about cash outside of banks for the M zero supply.
Speaker 1: I had the same problem too, like it's hard to
Speaker 1: think of money outside of banks in this day and age. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you could rarely have cash on hand us like debit
Speaker 1: cards and credit cards and all that kind of stuff. Yeah,
Speaker 1: American Express for everything. That's funny that on this audio
Speaker 1: podcast you just held it up to your face and
Speaker 1: you said that, um, so that's the M one. In
Speaker 1: June of of this year, of the M one supply
Speaker 1: was about two point five trillion, so the more money
Speaker 1: supply was one point two. The M one was two
Speaker 1: point five. That's all the accounts and checking accounts, travelers checks.
Speaker 1: Then there's the M two, which is the M one
Speaker 1: supply plus UH money market fund, money savings accounts, and
Speaker 1: CDs under a hundred grand, which they call small c
Speaker 1: d s, right comes from. That's a pretty good CD,
Speaker 1: well CD over a hundred grants called jumbo Yeah, I
Speaker 1: was looking up jumbo rates that used to be something
Speaker 1: like four and a quarter. Some of them would be
Speaker 1: like for like a ten year yeah, so you get
Speaker 1: like twenty two grand back over now I'm sorry, five years.
Speaker 1: So you go give a bank a hundred grand, say
Speaker 1: keep this for five years paying me back, and they
Speaker 1: would give you twenty two interests, So you get a
Speaker 1: hundred and twenty two cryan not very long ago, a
Speaker 1: couple of years ago before the crash. You want to
Speaker 1: know what it's at right now. For a hundred thousand
Speaker 1: dollar three year I believe c D, a jumbo c D,
Speaker 1: you get like one point four percent it's only worth
Speaker 1: your time to give a bank a hundred thousand dollars
Speaker 1: to keep for three years. They'll give you fourteen hundred dollars.
Speaker 1: As nine go to the dog track with a hundred
Speaker 1: thousand dollars and you leave Heroin Addict crying um. Alright,
Speaker 1: So the M to supply, which like I said, was
Speaker 1: it was the M one supply plus money market fund
Speaker 1: saving counts and those smaller CDs. Ten point five trillion.
Speaker 1: That's virtually all of the American money in the world
Speaker 1: pretty much, because they got rid of M three basically
Speaker 1: in two thousand six, because they said, it really doesn't
Speaker 1: tell us much to know what the larger jumbo CDs
Speaker 1: are adding to this pile. It doesn't change things that much,
Speaker 1: I guess. I imagine there's just not that many exactly.
Speaker 1: So about ten point five trillion US dollars in accounts
Speaker 1: and in cash um in holdings in the world in
Speaker 1: about July June July two that's a lot of dough
Speaker 1: to say. That's a lot of mula, right, and if
Speaker 1: you want to, yeah, it even says here it did.
Speaker 1: And that's when I looked up It's like who wrote this?
Speaker 1: It was like oops. I thought this was well done.
Speaker 1: Well and I learned how to spell mula. I didn't know.
Speaker 1: Don't don't pitch now, I'm serious. I literally thought, oh,
Speaker 1: that's how you spell mula. How do you think you
Speaker 1: spelled it? I don't know m U l A No,
Speaker 1: I'm just never thought of I've never seen it spelled
Speaker 1: out m O O l A. H Uh, that's a
Speaker 1: p standard exactly. So um this I think we've kind
Speaker 1: of pointed out it's tough to track money like this. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's not the easiest thing. They do a pretty good
Speaker 1: job of it that the FED does specifically because it's
Speaker 1: just what they do and they love doing that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but it's you know, it's an estimate still, Like, no
Speaker 1: one knows how much cash I have in my house,
Speaker 1: no one asked me no. But they know how much
Speaker 1: was printed, They keep track of that kind of stuff,
Speaker 1: how much is destroyed, how much in circulation, um. And
Speaker 1: you know there's bank reportings. They know how much a
Speaker 1: bank has at the FED UM, so they have a
Speaker 1: It's it's pretty close estimate from what I understand. The
Speaker 1: thing is, not every country has a FED like the
Speaker 1: FED in the US, and that makes it way harder
Speaker 1: to say how much money is in the entire world,
Speaker 1: not just US dollars, but all the money in the
Speaker 1: entire world, and more difficult to control your economy. It
Speaker 1: is if you if you don't know how much money
Speaker 1: you have, it's very difficult to sway your economy one
Speaker 1: way or the other. Right exactly. So, Um, Zimbabwe is
Speaker 1: a really good example, man, of why it's so hard
Speaker 1: to track a lot of money, and also what happens
Speaker 1: when you don't track your money, yeah, or what happens
Speaker 1: when you decide, in order to fix economic woes, let's
Speaker 1: just start printing more money, because that's um. If you
Speaker 1: know nothing about finance and economics, a common thing you
Speaker 1: might think is, well, they could probably just infuse some
Speaker 1: some cash flow by printing money occasionally, and they do occasionally.
Speaker 1: But in Zimbabwe they did it to such an extent
Speaker 1: with a zim dollar, which I didn't even believe that
Speaker 1: was right. It's actually called a zim dollar. Sounds like
Speaker 1: something from a movie. Um, not a good one exactly. Uh.
Speaker 1: They printed so much money that they encountered hyper inflation
Speaker 1: like the world has never seen before. Yeah, So it's ridiculous.
Speaker 1: Numbers yes, this hyper inflation in two thousand and six,
Speaker 1: it was. It was really bad, and two thousand Zimbabwe
Speaker 1: started to enter an inflationary spiral. Um In two thousand
Speaker 1: and six, it was so bad that a sheet, not
Speaker 1: a roll, a sheet of toilet paper cost four hundred
Speaker 1: and seventeen Zim dollars. Okay, yeah, a roll of toilet
Speaker 1: paper cost a hundred and forty five thousand, seven hundred
Speaker 1: and fifty dollars. Broke so quick and Zimbabwe, well, that's
Speaker 1: the thing. Everybody would have gone broke. But it wasn't
Speaker 1: that the toilet paper was very expensive. It was that
Speaker 1: the Zim dollars had very little purchasing power. And that
Speaker 1: was because dollars, just like any other commodity, are subject
Speaker 1: to the influences of supply and demand, and when there's
Speaker 1: a lot of them on the market, their value decreases.
Speaker 1: That's how the US government has managed to stay afloat
Speaker 1: so many times they release a bunch of money, They
Speaker 1: cause inflation so that the debts that they owe are
Speaker 1: worth less. So when they pay him off, it hurts
Speaker 1: the government less. It's a really horrible thing to do
Speaker 1: to your investors, but it's it's done. But that's the point.
Speaker 1: When you have a lot of dollars out there, you
Speaker 1: have less purchasing power per dollar. And that's what was
Speaker 1: going on in Zimbabwe, and things got really out of
Speaker 1: hand because they decided to fight this by printing more dollars. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they really got out of hand. That Some of these
Speaker 1: stats in here are just staggering. Um, you said that
Speaker 1: every what you didn't say, You report that it is
Speaker 1: estimated that it was equivalent to prices doubling in stores
Speaker 1: every one point three days. Yeah, the most I saw
Speaker 1: was every twenty four point seven hours. Prices. Essentially, we're
Speaker 1: being doubled by the way of the dollar losing value, right.
Speaker 1: Like the kind of inflation that we're looking at right
Speaker 1: here in America right now is like in the single
Speaker 1: digit percentiles, and it's being kept low by the Fed
Speaker 1: on purpose. But we're talking like doubling increase. Like the
Speaker 1: toilet papers this much the next day is twice as
Speaker 1: much the next day, it's three times that. And that's
Speaker 1: just not gonna affect economy. That's gonna like, I mean
Speaker 1: think about it. Its toilet paper costs that much money.
Speaker 1: People are gonna stop using toilet paper. That leads to
Speaker 1: poor sanitation, that leads to you know, it's just a
Speaker 1: domino effect. Well, there was a joke that the toilet
Speaker 1: paper was so expensive of the dollar, the zim zim
Speaker 1: dollar bought such a little toilet paper that it was
Speaker 1: actually more useful as toilet paper than to buy toilet
Speaker 1: paper with. Yeah, that's not funny, but well yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: appear in Zimbabwe is not. But the annual inflation was
Speaker 1: um estimated. Like this was watching Zimbabwe if you were
Speaker 1: a currency or monetary policy economists, it was like a
Speaker 1: dream come true. Last time something happened this bad it
Speaker 1: was Hungary in ninety six. I think we talked about that. Yeah, um,
Speaker 1: I think it was in the super Stuff Guide to
Speaker 1: Economics or spoken word album. Um. But the the inflation
Speaker 1: in Zimbabwe was estimated at five hundred and sixteen quintillion percent.
Speaker 1: That's by the end of two thousand eight. Okay, that's
Speaker 1: not even the highest that I've seen. Now, the highest
Speaker 1: I saw is eighty nine point seven sex tillion percent,
Speaker 1: which is a eighty nine point seven billion trillion percent
Speaker 1: or eighty nine point seven ten to the twenty one
Speaker 1: power percent. That was their annual rate of inflation, and
Speaker 1: that was probably early two thousand nine. Yeah, yeah, because
Speaker 1: in January two thousand nine they basically said you can
Speaker 1: start using four in currency again, which helps stabilizings a
Speaker 1: tiny the tiniest bit, but it it didn't obviously work well.
Speaker 1: It ended inflation abruptly because they abandoned these dollars. The
Speaker 1: currency lost value so much that everybody stopped using it
Speaker 1: and they went to the South African rand and the
Speaker 1: US dollar. That took four months from January to April
Speaker 1: for basically to completely abandon their money, right, so four
Speaker 1: months in the country's money is literally useless. And when
Speaker 1: they did, when they did abandon it was actually a
Speaker 1: pretty good move, Like you couldn't carry the economy with
Speaker 1: this money any longer because it was so value that
Speaker 1: they're in bad shape no matter what. But at least
Speaker 1: they that was a good move, right. And Um, the
Speaker 1: reason it was a good move because it stopped inflation
Speaker 1: because there weren't that many dollars and there weren't that
Speaker 1: many rands around, which means that they were scarce, which
Speaker 1: means again according to supply and demand, um, they were
Speaker 1: valuable and that hence they had purchasing power yeah, and um,
Speaker 1: it's really unbelieved doable. But it got so bad they
Speaker 1: were printing money in larger and larger denominations because they
Speaker 1: had to because people couldn't carry around. You'd have to
Speaker 1: have a suitcase full of money to buy your toilet paper.
Speaker 1: So they ended up producing a one hundred trillion Zimbabwean
Speaker 1: dollar note that you can now buy on eBay for
Speaker 1: about five bucks. Yeah, that's sad. While when it was
Speaker 1: released it was worth about thirty Yeah, and that's actual
Speaker 1: conversion rate, Like now it's only worth something on eBay.
Speaker 1: What there is? Yeah, there is no conversion rate, right, Um,
Speaker 1: I think I'm gonna get one, not just to have
Speaker 1: it do it? Yeah, okay, so get you one to thanks.
Speaker 1: What is it? Three hundred trillion dollar notes? Um, But
Speaker 1: that's the fact that the Zimbabwean government wasn't tracking their
Speaker 1: money in the first place, and they didn't track it
Speaker 1: after they kept releasing it again and again. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: there was no buy back program. They just said, you
Speaker 1: guys keep that. Um. They have no idea how many
Speaker 1: Zimbabwean dollars were released just in the century, let alone
Speaker 1: how many are out there on the market. So that's
Speaker 1: why it's virtually impossible to track how much money is
Speaker 1: out there in the world. But that hasn't stopped at
Speaker 1: least one guy. Well, actually that's not true. I talked
Speaker 1: to Catherine Whitbourne today and she was saying that the
Speaker 1: guy gave up the most recent figures she could find
Speaker 1: with two dozen ten because he's like, forget this, Yeah,
Speaker 1: miquet of dollar days with the z dot com um. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I guess he gave up on a huh that was
Speaker 1: his blog, his econ blog, and he was tracking a
Speaker 1: hundred thirty five currencies, uh in a hundred and sixty
Speaker 1: seven countries, and I guess December two thousand ten, it's
Speaker 1: probably one of the last stats he has then if
Speaker 1: that's when he quit. Um in his MO money equal
Speaker 1: to five point trillion in US dollars in circulation M
Speaker 1: two was fifty five trillion, So fifty five trillion bucks. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the value of all the money in the world
Speaker 1: occurring to Mike in US dollars, the US dollar value,
Speaker 1: but not just US dollars. That's everything, right, So there
Speaker 1: you have it. Okay, So this would be a lot
Speaker 1: easier to track and things like what happened in Zimbabwe
Speaker 1: wouldn't happen. You would never have hyper inflation if we
Speaker 1: all used a universal worldwide currency. Yeah, let's talk about that.
Speaker 1: No less than John Maynard Keynes has suggested that, and
Speaker 1: it's been bandied about for a long time since World
Speaker 1: War two, well even before then. Yeah, I don't think
Speaker 1: it's I think it was maybe closest to happening maybe
Speaker 1: after World War two, well, which wasn't very close. No,
Speaker 1: there were instances of what were to the people who
Speaker 1: were using the currency was effectively a universal currency like um,
Speaker 1: A lot the early imperial powers of China and Rome
Speaker 1: used a single currency in all the lands they conquered,
Speaker 1: which is why hordes of Roman silver coins are found
Speaker 1: in fields in the UK still today. Um. But it's
Speaker 1: still not technically a worldwide currency. But world War two
Speaker 1: we came very close, right. Yeah, let's talk about some
Speaker 1: of the pros. I guess, um, because it's I mean,
Speaker 1: if you look it up on the internet, there's a
Speaker 1: lot of debate still going on. Um, some of the pros.
Speaker 1: Speculators can't short a currency. That scenario you were talking about,
Speaker 1: like the value and currency to pay back debts, right,
Speaker 1: that'd be gone because it wouldn't be a commodity. There
Speaker 1: wouldn't any other currency to exchange it against. So therefore
Speaker 1: it's just a dollar just can be used to buy
Speaker 1: something you can't buy and sell it itself. It would
Speaker 1: be valueless like that. Exporters wouldn't have to worry about
Speaker 1: price gaps. There would be no conversion fees, which would
Speaker 1: free up money for like healthcare or whatever, I mean,
Speaker 1: something good to spend it on. Um. Of course, I'm
Speaker 1: just this is utopian outlook like, oh yeah, then they
Speaker 1: could spend it on healthcare ideally, but it would free
Speaker 1: up money. Um, it would in disputes about a currency manipulation, um,
Speaker 1: like China. Um. So they're like, there are some pros
Speaker 1: for sure. You wouldn't have to stand in line at
Speaker 1: the cambio centers and exchange your money when you traveled. No,
Speaker 1: and um convenience you mean and I went to Europe
Speaker 1: this summer and it was nice to not we just
Speaker 1: exchanged once. Yeah, that hadn't been since the euro It's
Speaker 1: like everywhere, um, and even in places in Croatia they
Speaker 1: still use their currency, but everybody accepts euros. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: bet they accept American dollars there too. Um, I kind
Speaker 1: of enjoyed the different currencies. Oh yeah, it's pretty and
Speaker 1: it's just neat. I kind of enjoyed the I mean,
Speaker 1: I guess it was. I didn't see it as a hassle.
Speaker 1: Maybe I was young, but I always thought it was
Speaker 1: kind of neat, Like, let me go turn in my
Speaker 1: francs for uh, for my German dollars. Well, it just
Speaker 1: sucks to lose money buying another currency, yeah, or to
Speaker 1: come out ahead though, that's when you're rocking right sometimes.
Speaker 1: But it's been a while since that happened. Well, this
Speaker 1: was in the mid ninety nineties, so the American dollar
Speaker 1: was we were doing pretty well in Eastern Europe. The
Speaker 1: dollar was sound as the pound, but we got killed
Speaker 1: in England of course, as always, because your pound is
Speaker 1: so awesome. Well, that was the big discrepancy after World
Speaker 1: War Two, Like when we came close to adopting universal currency,
Speaker 1: the Americans and the Brits couldn't decide on what to
Speaker 1: value it against the pound or the dollar, and so
Speaker 1: it just fell apart. Well, the Pew Research Center did
Speaker 1: a poll and apparently forty one of Americans believe that
Speaker 1: we will have a universal currency by Um, but the
Speaker 1: article I got that from, the guy speculates that could
Speaker 1: be because we're sort of programmed to think that the
Speaker 1: future will be like that, because every entirely, yeah, like
Speaker 1: every sci fi movie ever, it's like, you know, universal credits.
Speaker 1: It's not even like cash. So people just kind of
Speaker 1: have that in the back of their minds. So there's
Speaker 1: a lot of like drawbacks to a universal currency as well.
Speaker 1: There's some clever things you can do if you are
Speaker 1: in charge of your own currency and it's valued against
Speaker 1: other currencies. One of them is, if your economy is sluggish,
Speaker 1: you can release a lot of your currency, create inflation,
Speaker 1: drive prices down in your country compared to the um
Speaker 1: the buying power of a foreign currency, and attract that
Speaker 1: foreign currency and get your economy kick started again. If
Speaker 1: you're using the same currency as all these other countries
Speaker 1: that you're training with, sure there's not that that gap, right,
Speaker 1: the currency gap, But you also can't do that nice
Speaker 1: little trick that's probably would have bailed out Spain and
Speaker 1: Greece on their own had they not been trading the
Speaker 1: Euro or using the Euro the last couple of years. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a good point. Um, Some pundits think that the
Speaker 1: gold standard, if they were going to go to a
Speaker 1: universal currency, it would should be based on something like
Speaker 1: the gold Standard again or the gold standard period. But
Speaker 1: a lot of other people say, no, that's antiquated and
Speaker 1: just a bad idea. Yeah, potentially dangerous. I wonder how
Speaker 1: I would be dangerous. I don't know we should do
Speaker 1: one on the gold standard. I mean they got rid
Speaker 1: of it for a reason, so I don't know something
Speaker 1: about going back to something that but it was Nixon
Speaker 1: and got rid of it. So it's makes you think
Speaker 1: it's inherently evil getting rid of the gold standard, you know. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The other thing too, is who's going to run the show?
Speaker 1: Is really the big I think that's probably the biggest
Speaker 1: stumbling block. It's a huge one. Is it's there's got
Speaker 1: to be a universal body, an international reserve bank, central
Speaker 1: bank that has the authority on issuing these things buying
Speaker 1: them back. And yeah, I mean like every since the
Speaker 1: Clinton there, everybody has been nervous about that kind of thing.
Speaker 1: But even if you're not a paranoid type, you may
Speaker 1: just think that this body by definition would be incompetent
Speaker 1: just from looking at like the U, n UN has successes.
Speaker 1: Piece keeping missions are frequently very helpful and can add
Speaker 1: stability to a region. And then you have things like
Speaker 1: the International Panel on Climate Change, which releases its um
Speaker 1: it's opinions on climate change based on politics and diplomacy
Speaker 1: rather than science. Yeah, and you can't if you if
Speaker 1: it's a World Bank, there's too much at stake to
Speaker 1: make mistakes. And we already have a World Bank. It's
Speaker 1: just not in charge of every currency. And if it were,
Speaker 1: I mean, there could be problematic, It could be helpful,
Speaker 1: it could be problematic. I don't really fall down on
Speaker 1: either side of this. Yeah, I don't mean, I don't know.
Speaker 1: You know how I feel about economics. It's just as
Speaker 1: long as I can go buy my stuff and pay
Speaker 1: my mortgage. Yeah, I don't care if it's at the
Speaker 1: end or the dollar or the or the the community
Speaker 1: Financier dea freak, Frank, do you care if it's that? No,
Speaker 1: I had never heard of that. I didn't know. I
Speaker 1: thought the euro was sort of the only consolidator. But um,
Speaker 1: apparently in Africa, eight West African nations do share that
Speaker 1: West African CFA franc African Financial Community, Another six Central
Speaker 1: African nations share a Central African CFA franc which is
Speaker 1: weird because they're interchangeable. Yeah, two currencies that they can
Speaker 1: either one's fine. Yeah, I guess it's like when you
Speaker 1: go to Costa Rica or Mexico, you can use your dollars,
Speaker 1: you can use your paces. Yeah, I guess so. But
Speaker 1: apparently from interchangeable, I read that to mean like their
Speaker 1: valued the exact same, which is like, why I have
Speaker 1: two different currencies that are so similar that are the
Speaker 1: same value. Just make one c F a franc. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's good. Um. And then there was a lot of
Speaker 1: talk about hemispheric and regional unified currencies in Central America
Speaker 1: and South America, and they came very close, but the
Speaker 1: recent troubles from the Eurozone have made a lot of
Speaker 1: people back off about it. And in North America there
Speaker 1: was going to be the North American Union, which is Canada, Mexico,
Speaker 1: and the United States. Supposedly we're going to be fused
Speaker 1: together into one. It was like yes, and Canada was
Speaker 1: like right. America was like, well, we were going to
Speaker 1: come up with the amaro a m E r oh
Speaker 1: was the name of the unified currency that would have
Speaker 1: been interesting. Well, it's a conspiracy theory. At least, there
Speaker 1: you go. That's how much money is in the world.
Speaker 1: Any kind of weird. That not weird, but that America
Speaker 1: sandwich between such two different countries. It is like Canada Mexico.
Speaker 1: That's like, you can't get any more opposite. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: guess I'm at people, food economy, and then America's right
Speaker 1: in the middle. It's kind of fitting where the melting
Speaker 1: pot of Canada in Mexico. We are where it all
Speaker 1: comes together. America's had in America's pants. I can't remember
Speaker 1: what you've called Mexico before shoes m I don't think,
Speaker 1: so let's just call it Mexico. Uh, okay, So that's
Speaker 1: how much money there is in the world. If you
Speaker 1: want to read this article, you can type that into
Speaker 1: the search bar at how stuff Works dot com. And
Speaker 1: since I said search part, it's time for message brick
Speaker 1: uh and Chuck, what time is it now? It's time
Speaker 1: for it again, folks. This is when we thank people
Speaker 1: for sweet gifts that they send us in the mail.
Speaker 1: And I have a list of books starting with how
Speaker 1: Why How We Do Anything Means Everything? How Colin Why
Speaker 1: How We Do Anything Means Everything? By dove seedman as
Speaker 1: or do d o v yeah do do yeah. I
Speaker 1: appreciate that very nice a dovester. Do you want to
Speaker 1: say one more time? Okay, let's see. We got a
Speaker 1: postcard from Madagascar from Cara Levitt. Thank you very much
Speaker 1: for that. Nice. Another book by Alan Gerstel swing at Colin,
Speaker 1: The Search for My Father Louis Prima. Nobody read this one,
Speaker 1: but it deserves a double Um. We got a letter
Speaker 1: with further insight into the hip hop episode from b
Speaker 1: Boy Anti virus. Nice. How's he doing these doing? Great? Uh?
Speaker 1: Science nearly explained by Dick Maxwell, and that is available
Speaker 1: on Amazon or Kindle nice. Um. We have a postcard
Speaker 1: with a picture of the pair which you'll remember from
Speaker 1: the torture episode from the Museo de Torture from Anna
Speaker 1: Oh nice, thank you very much. Our buddy Roger Ma
Speaker 1: sent us to the Vampire Combat Manual and he's previously
Speaker 1: sinis the Zombie Combat Manual and Roger's good dude. We
Speaker 1: actually finally met him, didn't we. I don't know did
Speaker 1: we meet him. I think we met Roger at one
Speaker 1: of the comic cons. Okay, second, yeah, okay, I think
Speaker 1: you're right, hey Ron. Uh. We got a postcard from
Speaker 1: China from Carry Nice. We got another book called Trunkless.
Speaker 1: It's a children's book and I don't have the author here,
Speaker 1: but it's called Trunkless. I think we did that one before,
Speaker 1: did we? Alright? Double plug? Uh. We got another postcard
Speaker 1: from Bogram Airfield from Amy Lynn, thanks for that. We
Speaker 1: get a book called Verbifor's Feast for a Horse Feast
Speaker 1: by Christie the Word Smith and that was sent in
Speaker 1: by Hillary Nice. Uh. We got a postcard of a
Speaker 1: bear pooping in the woods from Van Nostrin. Thanks Van Nostran. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and we should mention to Van Nostron also sent us
Speaker 1: his CD from his awesome band, The Bangalore's Sasquatch with
Speaker 1: a mullet. Yes, thank you, buddy. Um. We got a
Speaker 1: comic zine called Happy Trails Cowboy Poetry by horse t
Speaker 1: Rushy Beard stash Um. We got a really cool cityscape
Speaker 1: watercolor card that was designed and sent by Alex, Thanks Alex.
Speaker 1: John Lennemeyer wrote a book called How an Average Man
Speaker 1: Lived an Adventurous Life and I haven't read that yet,
Speaker 1: but I'm going to good going, Chuck. Yeah. Um, We've
Speaker 1: got some CDs from Rich Bosick that may or may
Speaker 1: not have been all of them, but thank you very
Speaker 1: much for those. Yeah, and I believe he also sent
Speaker 1: us a DVD called Forgotten Detroit and a nice handwritten
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, inc rendering of ourselves? Right? Did you see that? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Is it the same guy? I think it's the same guy. Well,
Speaker 1: thank you very much big time. Rich. A book called
Speaker 1: Roman Disasters by Jerry Turner, and a book called the
Speaker 1: Life and Times of Swirly Van Coco stuff you should
Speaker 1: know edition. It's a comic actually from Aaron Dunbar. Yes,
Speaker 1: I remember what else we have, chuck uh. And then
Speaker 1: we have a bunch of music you want to go
Speaker 1: through these? Uh? Column blow double in disguise. That's right,
Speaker 1: Ben from self evidence in his c d s and
Speaker 1: vinyl of the record we built a fortress on short notice.
Speaker 1: We definitely plugged that one before the La La band
Speaker 1: sent us their CD Moonshine Still yep. The group called
Speaker 1: Forging Reverie cent U s a CD called Motion Canvas,
Speaker 1: and that was from Derek. Eric Davis and Sam Gray
Speaker 1: sent us a c D Table People and some authentic
Speaker 1: Korean junk food burke Uh. In graphia and Graphia send
Speaker 1: us download codes for his c D Jazz Animals, Right,
Speaker 1: Katie Center, send us a nice handwritten letter. She's doing
Speaker 1: something called the Letter Project, where she sends a letter
Speaker 1: to somebody who inspires her to ask what are you
Speaker 1: pursuing in your life? And do you know? How do
Speaker 1: you know when you've gotten there? Yeah? And we answered,
Speaker 1: did we? Yeah? I did for both of us. Oh nice,
Speaker 1: thanks man, I know what you I know what you're pursuing.
Speaker 1: I don't even have to do anythinking. Uh. And then
Speaker 1: we have one more vinyl and c D the shape
Speaker 1: of Beach to come from Ben Dick box Us band. Yes,
Speaker 1: that is b N D I K B A K
Speaker 1: S A A S. And she takes these finals. There's
Speaker 1: a couple over there on my desk. And thanks man.
Speaker 1: You got a record player? I do, and mine is busted.
Speaker 1: What happened to your record player? Oh? It's up in
Speaker 1: the attic endword per year or so until I get
Speaker 1: to go in. You should just take the vital I will. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And we appreciate the vinyl. By the way, it's very cool.
Speaker 1: I believe Benedict backs us um. Did we read his
Speaker 1: name for volunteering, no donating to co ED I believe.
Speaker 1: So yeah, well that's the same person then, thanks for
Speaker 1: that doubly. So that is administrative details for now. Thanks
Speaker 1: for the stuff. Yeah, we're all caught up. Very nice.
Speaker 1: I know it feels good. It didn't take like eight
Speaker 1: episodes to cover at all. Uh. If you want to
Speaker 1: send us something, you can get in touch with us
Speaker 1: by tweeting to us at s y s K podcast.
Speaker 1: You can join us on Facebook dot com, slash Stuff
Speaker 1: you Should Know. You can send us an email to
Speaker 1: Stuff Podcast at Discovery dot com, and you can join
Speaker 1: us at our home on the web, the awesome website
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know dot com for more on this
Speaker 1: and thousands of other topics. Does it how Stuff Works
Speaker 1: dot com