from what i read most of the gold-standards that were in the us were basically some gold and more paper claims for gold than there was gold.
i guess it was this disconnect that led to many economic problems in the past.
however…this link http://mises.org/econsense/ch78.asp says at the very bottom of the page :
"It is also why it would be far better to suffer a one-shot deflationary contraction of the fraudulent fractional-reserve banking system, and go back to a sound system of 100% reserves."
go back to a system of 100 percent gold reserves??? i dont know if the article is authentic or true.
i suspect it is a fake but i am not sure.
i have asked this question before and the only answer i got was that something called a bank of amsterdam for a century or so had 100 percent fully backed notes.
here is what i was told… The Bank of Amsterdam operated under a 100 percent reserve ratio for almost 150 years. B/c of this adherence to strict traditional laws of banking and avoidance of fractional reserve banking, it was a haven of finacial safety throughout Europe until, unfortunately, in 1802 it too came under the sway of corrupt practices and it resorted to the practice of fractional reserve banking,…"
https://forum.freecapitalists.org/t/has-a-100-precent-reserve-bank-existed/10286/14
so i am not sure about the go back to claim.
i dont know if this person actually knows or not…that is just the reply i got to this question “has a 100 percent bank ever existed?”
as for the great gold and silver finds i am not sure if they were funded from some type of unbacked paper or various credit advances for what appeared to be good yeilding mines or paid for directly with gold/silver coin or existing fully backed paper.
so as with the gold rush in california…the gold inflation i guess was short and sharp…and because it was gold none of the harmful credit contractions that i have read about at mises and lrc.
from my readings both the rothbard and the mises state a preference for gold and silver…but in different way state that free banking is their preference.
"No bank must be permitted to expand the total amount of its deposits subject to check or the balance of such deposits of any individual customer, be he a private citizen or the U.S. Treasury, otherwise than by receiving cash deposits in legal-tender banknotes from the public or by receiving a check payable by another domestic bank subject to the same limitations. This means a rigid 100 percent reserve for all future deposits; that is, all deposits not already in existence on the first day of the reform (p. 448)."
“If the governments had never interfered for the benefit of special banks, if they had never released some banks from the obligation, incumbent upon all individuals and firms in the market economy, to settle their liabilities in full compliance with the terms of the contract, no bank problem would have come into being.”
“Considerations of its own solvency would have forced every bank to cautious restraint in issuing fiduciary media…”
it seems that the mises advocates 100 percent reserves after the govt stops doing what it did and then because of considerations of solvency fiduciary media would be self limiting in some way.
my readings of the rothbard indicate that any unbacked paper would be fraud and 100 percent resereves would be the only way to bank.
i am not sure about what a current austrian perspective is. i have seen several references that the current currency system in the us in inflated in a harmful way. there are no more unbacked gold notes or unbacked notes at all really.
i have been told here, but havent been able to confirm, that the banks required reserves depend greatly on the account type (and that can change) and are controlled and governed by the federal reserve. so an claim to paper is only a phone call and a regulator away. i am not completely sure if that is good or bad.
this link may provide some additional info http://austrianeconomists.typepad.com/weblog/2009/09/mises-and-his-call-for-100-reserves.html