03-24-2017, 11:16 AM
(03-15-2017, 05:10 PM)SomeGuy Wrote:Quote:Thanks, I was not aware of a money-issuing facility still operative today that was not the Fed. However, are this notes fiat currency that can be issued in unlimited quantities without backing, or at they required to be backed by specie? If the former, why wasn't this being discussed in previous debt brinkmanship times? We had such things as the platinum coin, which is pretty out of the box. Why not issuing notes?
No problem. And no, US Notes are not and have never been backed by specie, though the government was occasionally willing to redeem them for such when asked. They're "greenbacks", Mike, come on!
As for why it wasn't discussed? I have no idea, probably for the same reason you just asked. People in the media hadn't thought of them. I have seen some mention of them on blogs and the like for about a decade now. If I am not mistaken, debt ceiling legislation specifically excludes US Notes from the debt ceiling calculation, despite them being in effect non-interest bearing instruments of credit.
I just read the Wiki article. I remember those things, they had the red serial numbers you would occasionally see on.