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SYSK Selects: How much money is there in the world?​ · Stuff You Should Know

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hey everyone, it's me Josh and for this week's s
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Y s K Select, I chose how Much Money Is
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: in the World? First aired in September two thousand thirteen.
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: And this is one of those topics that you kind
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: of wonder about ever since you're a little kid. I
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: know I did, and delightfully I found that as an
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: adult the answer was even more interesting than I had
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: imagined as a youngster. Youngster, that's what adults called kids,
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: right Well, anyway, this is one of my all time
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: favorite episodes. I hope you enjoy it as well. Welcome
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: to Stuff You Should Know from House Stuff Works dot com. Hey,
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark and I'm
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: with Charles W. Chuck Bryan. He's right here with me.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: So it's stuff you should know. It's also really stuff
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: you should know because Jerry's here too. Oh the chairs
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: now here. It's fake stuff you should know. It's less
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: than vintage stuff you should know, got you. I mean,
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: it's not bad, it's not great. I'm sure Matt and
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: everyone appreciate that. Dud. I listen to this cramp Yeah, uh, Chuck, Yes,
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: how much money do you have on you right now? Cash,
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: zero dollars and zero cents. Well, that's stupid, because you
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: should have thirty eight in cash on you. I never
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: have cash. Well, you should almost never have cash. You
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: should have thirty eight hundred dollars in cash on you
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: right now. So should I, so should Jerry. Um, but
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: we don't. We don't. It's sad. I'd love in my pocket. Okay, Well,
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: let's let's explain why I just said that. Huh was
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: I supposed to? That's all right, I'll do it. Um,
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: I can do it. That's how much if you divide
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: up all the money between all the Americans, that's how
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: much we should all have. Bam, bam. So we're trying
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: to answer a question here, how much money is there
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: in the world? Um, And we'll get to that. There's
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: a there's actually a rough estimate out there that may
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: be right. But instead, first let's talk about how much
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: American money there is in the world. And not just
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: because we're American, but because it is the standard currency worldwide.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: It's the closest thing to the universal currency that we have, um,
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: the dollar, the green back. Yeah. But um, that's not,
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: as I guess, um widespread as it once was. A
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: lot of people have abandoned the dollar UM and now
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: use a basket of currencies to value their currency against
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: very rebellious um. But still the dollar is generally what's
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: used to say, for oil speculation. And imagine the dollars
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: in that basket too though, right, maybe maybe not, It
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: depend on how much they hate America, gotcha? So um.
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: What you were talking about, though, was all the money
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: divided up by all the Americans coming up to thirty dollars.
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: That's called the M zero money supply. Of course, you
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: know how I read that m O the more money Supply.
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: I was like, what, and then I read I read
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: it again. I said, it can't be called the MO
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: money supply, and then I realized that was a zero
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: and not an Oh it it looks very much like
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: the MO money Supply. I wrote this article. I realized it,
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: and I never saw it like that until you just
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: said that. Really, Yeah, I like the MO money supply
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: better than the m OH. It's good, but it is
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: m O for a reason. There's also the M one,
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: M two, and there wasn't M three, which we'll get
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: to right. And the people who came up with this
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: was the federal Reserve Bank, the United States Central Bank,
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: the FED, right, and they like to track money. That's
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: one of the things they do to amuse themselves. Count yeah,
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: count money, um, and go to sleep on pile of
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: gold ingots. But the FED came up with this M
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: I'm sorry, this more Money Supply, also known as the
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: M zero supply, and that is all of the bills
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: and coins, all of the actual hard currency that exists
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: in the world anywhere in US dollars. And as of
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: July two thirteen. Hey, that's recent. Yeah, that came to
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: always should say Catherine Whitbourne from The Coolest Stuff on
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: the Planet. She updated this. So the fact that this
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: is as up today as it is is thanks to her. UM.
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: But the the M so, the more Money Supply as
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: of July two thirteen is one point to trillion dollars.
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  Speaker 1: That's all the cash and all the coins all over
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  Speaker 1: the world of American dollars, the real dollars that you
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: can collect and put together you can light your cigars with, yeah,
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: or you can throw into a fountain. Yeah. At one
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: point to trillion US dollars. So that's how much money
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: was in the world. But and and we said also
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: that's thirty eight hundred for every American man, woman, and child.
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  Speaker 1: All three hundred and sixteen million, six hundred and sixty
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: eight thousand, five hundred and sixty seven Americans that were
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: alive in July of two thousand thirteen, each one should
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: have had thirty eight hundred bucks in their pocket. Because
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: we're not talking checking accounts, we're talking the actual currency
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: that people are walking around with. Since I don't have
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: thirty eight hundred dollars in my pocket, and I didn't
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: in July, you don't, Jerry, Nope, Jerry's got more. Where
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: is this stuff? That's a good question. I wonder how
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: that clock ticks, by the way, the population clock. I'd
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: like to see a real time like three people died,
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: four people born, people died, eight people born, said its wins.
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: I wonder if it ever does go backwards for a second.
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: It's got too because people are dying, but more people
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: are being born than people are dying. Yeah, it depends
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: on the country you're talking about. Yeah, that's true. Um,
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: I always drive by the one in Atlanta, you know,
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: on the population clock that's been there forever. When I
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: was a kid, I remember when the top two million
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: it was like whoa wow, and now it's whatever three
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: points something is it? Yeah? I mean that's metro Atlanta, right,
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: it's not city of Atlanta. Um, alright, so back to it. Uh,
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: where were we hard to track the more money? No,
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: we were talking about where the thirty eight hundred bucks
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: that should be in our pockets is? Oh well, um,
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: about a half to two thirds of that is overseas.
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: It's an overseas pockets, that's right, or overseas bank accounts
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: or no, no, we're not talking bank accountants. Wait, that's
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: just the money, that's right. Yeah. So that means that
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: there are people walking around overseas with cash on them
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: American dollar American dollars, which makes a lot of sense.
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: And so when you start to divide the amount of money,
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: at one point two trillion buy a lot more than
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: three hundred and sixteen million people. That explains why I
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: have a single dollar bill on my person right now,
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: why I have nothing? All right? And Jerry nothing nothing man,
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: we're sad sex Okay, So that's just the MO money supply. Yeah,
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: the M zero, the M one is all of the
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: MO money plus checking account money and other kinds of
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: just accounts that you can you know, track and travelers checks. Yeah,
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: very very liquid types of accounts. Yes, that's the M one,
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah supply that And it's funny that you were having
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: trouble wrapping your head around the fact that we were
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: talking about cash outside of banks for the M zero supply.
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: I had the same problem too, like it's hard to
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: think of money outside of banks in this day and age,
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: you could rarely have cash on hand use like debit
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: cards and credit cards and all that kind of stuff.
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah's American Express for everything. That's funny that on this
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: audio podcast you just held it up to your face
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: when you said that. Um, so that's the M one.
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: In June of of this year, the M one supply
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: was about two point five trillion, So the momentey supply
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: was one point two. The M one was two point five.
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  Speaker 1: That's all the accounts and checking accounts, travelers checks. Then
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: there's the M two, which is the M one supply
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: plus uh money market fund, money savings accounts, and CDs
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: under a hundred grand, which they call small c ds
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: right from that's a pretty good CD. Well, c D
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: over a hundred grands called a jumbo. Yeah. I was
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: looking up jumbo right there used to be something like
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: four and a quarter. Some of them would be like
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: for like a ten year. Yeah, so you get like
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: twenty two grand back over now I'm sorry, five years.
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: So you go give a bank a hundred grand, say
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: keep this for five years paying me back, and they
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: would give you twenty two interests. So you get a
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: hundred and twenty two cran This not very long ago,
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: a couple of years ago before the crash. You want
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: to know what it's at right now, for a hundred
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: thousand dollar three year I believe c D a jumbo
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: c D, you get like one point four percent. It's
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: only worth your time to give a bank a hundred
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: thousand dollars to keep for three years. They'll give you
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: fourteen hundred dollars. Asinine go to the dog track with
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: a hundred thousand dollars and you leave a heroin addict crying. Um. Alright,
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: So the M to supply, which like I said, was
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: it was the M one supply plus money market fund
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: saving counts and those smaller CDs ten point five trillion.
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  Speaker 1: That's virtually all of the American money in the world
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: pretty much. Because they got rid of M three basically
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: in two thousand six, because they said it really doesn't
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: tell us much to know what the larger jumbo CDs
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: are adding to this pile. It doesn't change things that much,
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: I guess. I imagine there's just not that many exactly.
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: So about ten point five trillion US dollars in accounts
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: and in cash um in holdings in the world in
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: about July June July of two. That's a lot of dough.
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: That's a lot of mula, all right, And if you
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: want to, yeah, it even says in't here that's it did.
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: And that's when I looked up. It's like who wrote this?
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: It was like, oops, I thought this was well done.
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: Well and I learned how to spell mulah. I didn't know.
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: Don't don't Patre, Now I'm serious. I literally thought, oh,
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: that's how you spell mula. How do you think you
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: spelled it? I don't know. M u l a no.
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: I just never thought of I've never seen it spelled
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: out m O O l a. H Uh. That's a
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: p standard exactly. So, um this I think we've kind
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: of pointed out it's tough to track money like this. Well, yeah,
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: it's not the easiest thing. They do a pretty good
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: job of it that the FED does specifically because it's
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: just what they do and they love doing that. Yeah,
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: but it's you know, it's an estimate still, like no
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: one knows how much cash I have in my house,
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: no one asked me, no, But they know how much
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: was printed. They keep track of that kind of stuff,
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: how much is destroyed, how much in circulation um. And
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: you know there's bank reportings. They know how much a
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: bank has at the FED UM, so they have a
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: It's it's pretty close estimate from what I understand. The
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: thing is, not every country has a FED like the
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: FED in the US, and that makes it way harder
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: to say how much money is in the entire world,
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: not just US dollars, but all the money in the
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: entire world, and more difficult to control your economy. It is,
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: if you if you don't know how much money you have,
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: it's very difficult to sway your economy one way or
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: the right exactly. So UM Zimbabwe is a really good example,
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: man of why it's so hard to track a lot
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: of money, and also what happens when you don't track
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: your money, yeah, or what happens when you decide in
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: order to fix economic woes, let's just start printing more money,
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: because that's um. If you know nothing about finance and economics,
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: a common thing you might think is, well, they could
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: probably just infuse some some cash flow by printing money occasionally,
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: and they do occasionally. But in Zimbabwe they did it
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: to such an extent with a zim dollar, which I
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: didn't even believe that was right. It's actually called a
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: zim dollar. Sounds like something from a movie. Um, not
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: a good one exactly. Uh. They printed so much money
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: that they encountered hyper inflation like the world has never
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: seen before. Yeah, so it's ridiculous numbers. Yes, this hyper
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: inflation in two thousand and six, it was. It was
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: really bad and two thousand Zimbabwe started to or an
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: inflationary spiral. Um. In two thousand and six, it was
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: so bad that a sheet, not a roll, a sheet
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: of toilet paper cost four hundred and seventeen zim dollars. Okay, yeah,
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: a roll of toilet paper cost a hundred and forty
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: five thousand, seven hundred and fifty dollars. Well that's the thing.
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: Everybody would have gone broke. But it wasn't that the
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: toilet paper was very expensive. It was that the Zim
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: dollars had very little purchasing power, and that was because dollars,
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: just like any other commodity, are subject to the influences
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: of supply and demand, and when there's a lot of
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: them on the market, their value decreases. That's how the
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: US government has managed to stay afloat so many times
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: they release a bunch of money. They cause inflation so
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: that the debts that they owe are worth less, so
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: when they pay them off, it hurts the government less.
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: It's a really horrible thing to do to your investors,
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: but it's it's done. But that's the point. When you
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: have a lot of dollars out there, you have less
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: purchasing power per dollar. And that's what was going on
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: in Zimbabwe, and things got really out of hand because
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: they decided to fight this by printing more dollars. Yeah,
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: they really got out of hand. That Some of these
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: stats in here are just staggering. Um, you said that
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: every what you didn't say you report that. Um, it
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: was estimated that it was equivalent to prices doubling in
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: stores every one point three days. Yeah, the most I
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: saw was every twenty four point seven hours prices. Essentially,
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: we're being doubled by the way of the dollar losing value. Right,
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: Like the kind of inflation that we're looking at right
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: here in America right now is like in the single
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: digit percentiles, and it's being kept low by the Fed
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: on purpose. But we're talking like doubling increase. Like the
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: toilet papers this much the next day is twice as much.
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: The next day it's three times that. And that's just
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: not gonna affect economy. That's gonna like, I mean, think
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: about it. Its toilet paper costs that much money. People
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: are gonna stop using toilet paper. That leads to poor sanitation,
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: that leads to you know, it's just a domino effect. Well,
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: there was a joke that the toilet paper was so
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: expensive of the dollar, the zim zim dollar bought such
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: a little toilet paper that it was actually more useful
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: as toilet paper than to buy toilet paper with. Ye
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: that's not funny, but well yeah, if you're in Zimbabwe,
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: is not. But the annual inflation was um estimated. Like
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: this was watching Zimbabwe. If you were a currency or
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: monetary policy economists, it was like a dream come true.
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: Last time something happened this bad. It was Hungary in
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: n I think we talked about that once. Yeah, um,
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: I think it was in the super Stuff Guide to
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: Economics or Spoken Word album. Um. But the the inflation
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: in Zimbabwe was estimated at five hundred and sixteen quintillion percent.
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: That's by the end of two thousand and eight. Okay,
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: that's not even the highest that I've seen. Now, the
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: highest I saw is eighty nine point seven sex tillion percent,
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: which is a eighty nine point seven billion trillion percent
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: or eighty nine point seven ten to the twenty one
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: power percent. That was their annual rate of inflation, and
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: that was probably early two thousand nine. Yeah, yeah, because
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: in January two thousand nine they basically said you can
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: start using foreign currency again, which helps stabilizings a tiny
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: the tiniest bit, but it it didn't obviously work well.
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: It ended inflation abruptly because they abandoned these dollars. The
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: currency lost value so much that everybody stopped using it
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: and they went to the South African rand and the
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: US dollar. That took four months from January to April
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: for basically to completely abandon their money, right, So four
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: months in the country's money is literally useless, right, and
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: when they did, when they did abandon it was actually
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: a pretty good move. Like you couldn't carry the economy
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: with this money any longer because it was so value
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: that they're in bad shape no matter what. But at
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: least they that was a good move, right. And Um,
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: the reason it was a good move because it stopped
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: inflation because there weren't that many dollars and there weren't
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: that many rands around, which means that they were scarce,
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: which means again according to supply and demand, Um, they
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: were valuable and that hence they had purchasing power. Yeah,
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: and um, it's really unbelievable. But it got so bad
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: they were printing money in larger and larger denominations because
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: they had to, because people couldn't carry around. You'd have
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: to have a suitcase full of money to buy your
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: toilet paper. So they ended up producing a one hundred
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: trillion Zimbabwean dollar note that you can now buy on
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: eBay for about five bucks. Yeah, that's sad. While when
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: it was released it was worth about thirty Yeah, and
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: that's actual conversion rate, Like now it's only worth something
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: on eBay. Yeah, there is no conversion rate, right, Um,
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: I think I'm gonna get one, not just to have
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: it do it? Yeah, okay, so what is it? Three
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: d trillion dollar notes? Um? But that's the fact that
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: the Zimbabwean government wasn't tracking their money in the first place,
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: and they didn't track it after they kept releasing it
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: again and again, and there was no buyback program. They
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: just said, you guys keep that. Um. They have no
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: idea how many Zimbabwean dollars were released just in the century,
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: let alone how money are out there on the market.
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: So that's why it's virtually impossible to track how much
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: money is out there in the world. But that hasn't
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: stopped at least one guy. Well, actually that's not true.
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: I talked to Katherine Whitbourne today and she was saying
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: that the guy gave up the most recent figures she
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: could find with two dozens him because he's like, forget this, Yeah,
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: miquet of dollar days with the z dot com. Um, yeah,
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: I guess he gave up on a huh that was
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: his blog, his econ blog, and he was tracking a
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: hundred thirty five currencies uh in a hundred and sixty
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: seven countries, and I guess December two, thou ten is
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: probably one of the last stats he has then if
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: that's when he quit UM in his MO money equal
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: to five point trillion in US dollars in circulation M
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: two was fifty five trillion, So fifty five trillion bucks. Yeah,
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: that's the value of all the money in the world
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: occurring to Mike in US dollars, the US dollar value. Yeah,
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: but not just US dollars. That's everything, right, So there
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: you have it. Okay, So this would be a lot
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: easier to track and things like what happened in Zimbabwe
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: wouldn't happen. You would never have hyper inflation if we
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: all used a universal worldwide currency. Yeah, let's talk about that.
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: No less than John Maynard Keynes has suggested that, and
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: it's been bandied about for a long time since World
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: War two, well even before then. Yeah, I don't think
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: it's I think it was maybe closest to happening maybe
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: after World War two, well, which wasn't very close. You know,
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: there were instances of what were to the people who
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: were using the currency was effectively a universal currency like UM.
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: A lot the early imperial powers of China and Rome
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: used a single currency in all the lands they conquered,
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: which is why hordes of Roman silver coins are found
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: in fields in the UK still today. Um, but it's
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: still not technically a worldwide currency. But world War two
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: we came very close, right. Yeah. Let's talk about some
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: of the pros. I guess, um, because it's I mean,
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: if you look it up on the internet, there's a
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: lot of debate still going on. Um. Some of the pros.
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: Speculators can't short a currency. That scenario you were talking about,
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: like the value and currency to pay back debts, right,
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: that'd be gone because it wouldn't be a commodity. There
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: wouldn't any other currency to exchange it against. So therefore
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: it's just a dollar just can be used to buy
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: something you can't buy and sell it itself. It would
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: be valueless like that. Exporters wouldn't have to worry about
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: price gaps. There would be no conversion fees, which would
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: free up money for like healthcare or whatever, I mean,
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: something good to spend it on. Um. Of course, I'm
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: just this is utopian outlook like, oh yeah, then they
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: could spend it on healthcare ideally, but it would free
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: up money. Um, it would end disputes about a currency
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: manipulation um like China. Um. So they're like there are
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: some pros. For sure, you wouldn't have to stand in
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: line at the combie centers and exchange your money when
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: you traveled, No, and um convenience you. Me and I
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: went to Europe this summer and it was nice to
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: not We just exchanged once. Yeah, that hasn't been since
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: the euro it's like everywhere, um, and even in places
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: in Croatia they still use their currency, but everybody accepts euros. Yeah.
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: I bet they accept American dollars there too. Um. I
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: kind of enjoyed the different currencies. Oh yeah, it's pretty
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: and it's just neat. I kind of enjoyed the I mean,
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: I guess it was. I didn't see it as a hassle.
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: Maybe I was young, but I always thought it was
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: kind of neat, Like let me go turn in my
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: francs for uh for my German dollars. Well, it just
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: sucks to lose money buying another currency, yeah, or to
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: come out ahead though, that's when you're rocking right sometimes.
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: But it's been a while since that happened. Well, this
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: was in the mid ninety nineties, so the American dollar
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: was we were doing pretty well in Eastern Europe the
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: dollar was sound as the pound, but we we got
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: killed in England of course, as always, yeah, because your
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: pound is so awesome. Well, that was the big discrepancy
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: after World War Two, like when we came close to
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: adopting universal currency, the Americans and the Brits couldn't decide
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: on what to value it against the pound or the dollar,
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: and so it just fell apart. Well, the Pew Research
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: Center did a poll and apparently of Americans believe that
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: we will have a universal currency by um But the
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: article I got that from, the guy speculates that could
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: be because we're sort of programmed to think that the
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: future will be like that, because every entirely, yeah, like
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: every sci fi movie ever, it's like, you know, universal credits.
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: It's not even like cash. So people just kind of
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: have that in the back of their minds. So there's
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: a lot of like drawbacks to a universal currency as well.
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: There's some clever things you can do if you are
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: in charge of your own currency and it's valued against
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: other currencies. One of them is, if your economy is sluggish,
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: you can release a lot of your currency create inflation,
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: drive prices down in your country compared to the um
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: the buying power of a foreign currency, and attract that
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: foreign currency and get your economy kick started again. If
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: you're using the same currency as all these other countries
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: that you're trading with. Sure there's not that that gap, right,
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: the currency gap, But you also can't do that nice
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: little trick that's probably would have bailed out Spain and
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: Greece on their own had they not been trading the
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: Euro or using the Euro the last couple of years. Yeah,
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: that's a good point. Um. Some pundits think that the
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: gold standard, if they were going to go to a
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: universal currency, it would should be based on something like
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: the gold Standard again or the gold Standard period. But
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: a lot of other people say, no, that's antiquated and
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: just a bad idea. Yeah, potentially dangerous. I wonder how
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: I would be dangerous. I don't know. We we should
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: do one on the gold standard. I mean, they got
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: rid of it for a reason, so I don't know
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: something about going back to something that but it was
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: Nixon and get rid of it. So it's makes you
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: think it's inherently evil getting rid of the gold standard,
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: you know, The other thing, too, is who's going to
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: run the show? Is really the big I think that's
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: probably the biggest stumbling block. It's a huge one. Is
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: it's there's got to be a universal body, an international
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: reserve bank, central bank, that has the authority on issuing
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: these things buying them back. And yeah, I mean, like
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: ever since the Clinton there, everybody has been nervous about
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: that kind of thing. But even if you're not a
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: paranoid type, you may just think that this body by
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: definition would be incompetent just from looking at like the
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: U n UN has successes. Piece keeping missions are frequently
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: very helpful and can add stability to a region. And
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: then you have things like the International Panel on Climate Change,
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: which releases it's um it's opinions on climate change based
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: on politics and diplomacy rather than science. Yeah, and you
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: can't if you if it's a world bank. There's too
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: much at stake to make mistakes. And we already have
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: a World bank. It's just not in charge of every currency.
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: And if it were, I mean there, it could be problematic.
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: It could be helpful, it could be problematic. I don't
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: really fall down on either side of this. Yeah, I
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: mean I don't know. You know how I feel about economics.
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: It's just as long as I can go buy my
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: stuff and pay my mortgage. Yeah, I don't care if
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: it's at the end or the dollar or the or
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: the the community financier deaf freak frank do you care
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: if it's that? No, I had never heard of that.
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: I didn't know. I thought the euro was sort of
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: the only consolidator. But um, apparently in Africa, eight West
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: African nations do share that West African CFA franc African
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: Financial Community. Another six Central African nations share a Central
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: African CFA franc which is weird because they're interchangeable. Yeah,
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: two currencies that they can either one's fine. Yeah, I
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: guess it's like when you go to Costa Rica, right,
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: or Mexico you can use your dollars, you can use
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: your pass. Yeah, I guess so. But apparently from interchangeable,
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: I read that to me like they're valued the exact same,
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: which is like, why I have two different currencies that
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: are so similar that are the same value. Just make
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: one c f A franc um. And then there was
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: a lot of talk about hemispheric and regional unified currencies
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: in Central America and South America, and they came very close,
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: but the recent troubles from the Eurozone have made a
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: lot of people back off about it. And uh, in
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: North America, there was going to be the North American Union,
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: which is Canada, Mexico, and the United States. Supposedly we're
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: going to be fused together into one and it was
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: like yes, and Canada was like right in America was like, well,
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: we were going to come up with the amaro A
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: M E r oh was the name of the unified currency.
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: That would have been interesting. Well, it's a conspiracy theory
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: at least. Okay, there you go. That's how much money
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: is in the world. Any kind of weird. That not weird,
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: but that America's sandwich between such two different countries. It is,
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: I can in Mexico. That's like, you can't get any
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: more opposite. Yeah, I guess simon people, food, economy, and
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: then America's right in the middle. It's kind of fitting
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: where the melting pot of Canada in Mexico. Yes, we
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: are where it all comes together. America's had in America's pants.
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: I can't remember what you've called Mexico before. Shoes m
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: I don't think, so let's just call it Mexico. Uh. Okay,
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: So that's how much money there is in the world.
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: If you want to read this article, you can type
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: that into the search bart how Stuff works dot com.
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: And since I said search part, it's time for message break.
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: Uh and Chuck, what time is it? Now? It's time
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: for it is again, folks. This is when we thank
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: people for sweet gifts that they send us in the mail.
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: And I have a list of books starting with how Why,
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: How We Do Anything Means Everything? How Colon Why How
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: We Do Anything Means Everything? By Dove Seedman or dov
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: d o v Yeah, Dove Dove Yeah. I appreciate that
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: they were very nice a dovester. Do you want to
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: say one more time? No? Okay, let's see. We got
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: a postcard from Madagascar from Kara Levitt, Thank you very
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: much for that. Nice Another book by Alan Gerstel swing
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: at Colin, The Search for My Father Louis Prima. Nobody
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: read this one, but it deserves a double um. We
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: got a letter with further insight into the hip hop
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: episode from b Boy Anti Virus. Nice yea. How's he
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: doing these days? It's doing great? Uh. Science Nearly Explained
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: by Dick Maxwell, and that is available on Amazon or
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: Kindle nice. Um. We have a postcard with a picture
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: of the pair, which you'll remember from the Torture episode
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: from the Museo de Torture from Anna Oh Nice, thank
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: you very much. Our buddy Roger Ma sent us to
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: the Vampire Combat Manual and he's previously sinis the Zombie
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: Combat Manual and Roger's good. Do we actually finally met him?
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: Didn't we? I don't know did we meet him? I
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: think we met Roger at one of the comic consay taken. Yeah, okay,
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: I think you're right, hey rod. Uh. We got a
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: postcard from China from Carry Nice. We got another book
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: called Trunkless. It's a children's book and I don't have
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: the author here, but it's called Trunkless. I think we
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: did that one before, did we? Alright? Double plug? Uh.
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: We got another postcard from Bogram Airfield from Amy Lynn,
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: Thanks for that. We got a book called Verbifor's Feast
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: Verbie Horse Feast by Christie the Word Smith and that
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: was sent in by Hillary Nice. Uh. We got a
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: postcard of a bear pooping in the woods from Van Nostrin. Thanks. Yeah,
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: and we should mention too. Van Nostron also sent us
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: his CD from his awesome band, The Bangalore's Sasquatch with
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: a mullet. Yes, thank you, buddy. Um. We got a
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: comic zine called Happy Trails Cowboy Poetry by Horace T.
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: Rushy Beard stash Um. We got a really cool cityscape
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: watercolor card that was designed and sent by Alex. Thanks Alex.
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: John Lennemeyer wrote a book called How An Average Man
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: Lived an Adventurous Life. And I haven't read that yet,
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: but I'm going to good going chuck. Yeah. Um. We
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: got some CDs from Rich Boswick that may or may
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: not have been all of them, but thank you very
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: much for those. Yeah, and I believe he also sent
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: us a DVD called Forgotten Detroit and a nice handwritten
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: or I'm sorry, inc Rendering of Ourselves? Right? Did you
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: see that? Yeah? Is it the same guy? I think
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: it's the same guy. Well, thank you very much big time.
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: A book called Roman Disasters by Jerry Turner, and a
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: book called the Life and Times of Swirly Van Coco.
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: Stuff you should know edition. It's a comic actually from
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: Aaron Dunbar yes, I remember what else we have, chuck. Uh.
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: And then we have a bunch of music you want
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: to go through these? Uh? Colum blow Double in Disguise,
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: that's right, Ben from self evidence in his c D
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: s and vinyl of the record. We built a fortress
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: on short notice, so we've definitely plugged that one before.
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: The La La band sent us their c D Moonshine
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: Still yep. The group called Forging Reverie sent us a
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: CD called Motion Canvas, and that was from Derek. Eric
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: Davis and Sam Gray sent us a c D table
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: People and some authentic Korean junk food. Burke Uh in
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: Graphia or in Graphia sent us download codes for his
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: c D Jazz Animals. Right. Katie Center sent us a
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: nice handwritten letter. She's doing something called the Letter Project,
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: where she sends a letter to somebody who inspires her
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: to ask what are you pursuing in your life? And
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: do you know? How do you know when you've gotten there? Yeah? Yeah,
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: and we answered, did we? Yeah? I did? Oh? And
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: nice for both of us. Oh nice, thanks man, I
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: know what you I know what you're pursuing. I don't
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: even have to do me thinking. Uh. And then we
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: have one more vinyl and c D the shape of
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: beats to come from bendick box us band. Yes that
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: is b E N D I K B A K
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: S A A S and should take these vinyls. There's
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: a couple over there on my desk. And thanks man.
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: You got a record player if I do and mine
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: is busted. What happened to your record player? Oh it's
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: up in the attic endword pree year or so until
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: I get to go in and should just take the
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: vinyl will Yeah? And we appreciate the vinyl by the way,
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: it's very cool. I believe Benedict backs us. Um do
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: we read his name for volunteering no donating to co
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: ed Oh maybe I believe so. Yeah. Well if that's
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: the same person, then thanks for that doubly. So that
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: is administrative details for now. Thanks for the stuff. Yeah,
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: we're all caught up. Very nice. I know it feels good.
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: It didn't take like eight episodes to cover it, right. Uh.
• 34:55
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• 34:57
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