Can Anyone Explain the 1 Trillion Dollar Coin

[Tidybuoy]

I am baffled. The congress is proposing that the mint create a 1 Trillion Dollar Coin which will then be transferred to the Federal Reserve and will eliminate the need to raise the debt limit.

Does this make sense to anybody??

It seems like I hear on a daily basis that "millionaires and billionaires" are not paying their fair share and "cheating" on their taxes, yet when the government spending gets out of control, they can simply stamp out a $10,000 coin and label it 1 Trillion Dollars and their problem is instantly solved.

I would love to hear opinions on this subject.

[stevej37]

Tabs is the man for this question.

He will arrive shortly.

[id10t]

There is a Pratchett quote for darn near anything..... strongly recommend reading Going Postal for some background on Moist, and then reading Making Money.

'Somehow I was expecting something… bigger,' said Moist, looking through the steel bars into the little room that held the gold. The metal, in open bags and boxes, gleamed dully in the torchlight.

'That is almost ten tons of gold,' said Bent reproachfully. 'It does not have to look big.'

'But all the ingots and bags put together aren't much bigger than the desks out there!'

'It is very heavy, Mr Lipwig. It is the one true metal, pure and unsullied,' said Bent. His left eye twitched. 'It is the metal that never fell from grace.'

'Really?' said Moist, checking that the door out of there was still open.

'And it is also the only basis of a sound financial system,' Mr Bent went on, while the torchlight reflected off the bullion and gilded his face. 'There is Value! There is Worth! Without the anchor of gold, all would be chaos.'

'Why?'

'Who would set the value of the dollar?'

'Our dollars are not pure gold, though, are they?'

'Aha, yes. Gold-coloured, Mr Lipwig,' said Bent. 'Less gold than seawater, gold-ish. We adulterated our own currency! Infamy! There can be no greater crime!' His eye twitched again.

'Er… murder?' Moist ventured.

Yep, the door was still open. Mr Bent waved a hand. 'Murder only happens once,' he said, 'but when the trust in gold breaks down, chaos rules. But it had to be done. The abominable coins are, admittedly, only gold-ish, but they are at least a solid token of the true gold in the reserves. In their wretchedness, they nevertheless acknowledge the primacy of gold and our independence from the machinations of government! We ourselves have more gold than any other bank in the city, and only I have a key to that door! And the chairman has one too, of course,' he added, very much as a grudging and unwelcome afterthought.

'I read somewhere that the coin represents a promise to hand over a dollar's worth of gold,' said Moist helpfully.

Mr Bent steepled his hands in front of his face and turned his eyes upwards, as though praying. 'In theory, yes,' he said after a few moments. 'I would prefer to say that it is a tacit understanding that we will honour our promise to exchange it for a dollar's worth of gold provided we are not, in point of fact, asked to.'

'So… it's not really a promise?'

'It certainly is, sir, in financial circles. It is, you see, about trust.'

'You mean, trust us, we've got a big expensive building?'

'You jest, Mr Lipwig, but there may be a grain of truth there.' Bent sighed. 'I can see you have a lot to learn. At least you'll have me to teach you. And now, I think, you would like to see the Mint. People always like to see the Mint. It's twenty-seven minutes and thirty-six seconds past one, so they should have finished their lunch hour.'

[cockerpunk]

money is indeed a social construct.

[Aurel]

Here is my take on it:

Looks like the feds have found a new way to raise the debt ceiling without generating inflation, by minting coins instead of printing bills. I guess because the coins are made of platinum they have some intrinsic value. Anyways, this really feels like scraping some spare change from drawers and pockets to pay the monthly bills...

https://www.axios.com/trillion-dollar-platinum-coin-mint-janet-yellen-223e7722-d7ba-47c9-b5f6-49a841d181de.html

[Norm K]

Why not just go all in and mint a couple of dozen of these? We can hand them out to our creditors, tell them to simply subtract our current balance and to hold the remainder as credit against any future debts we might incur with them. Oh, and we can tell them not to worry: we have adequate supplies of platinum and can mint more as may be needed.

Financial problems solved.

_

[Aurel]

Originally Posted by Norm K

Why not just go all in and mint a couple of dozen of these? We can hand them out to our creditors, tell them to simply subtract our current balance and to hold the remainder as credit against any future debts we might incur with them. Oh, and we can tell them not to worry: we have adequate supplies of platinum and can mint more as may be needed.

Financial problems solved.

_

Platinum ain’t cheap. Right now, they plan on minting with what they have on hand.

But come to think about it, platinum is used for catalytic converters, and if the cars move to EV, there will be more available…

[Arizona_928]

Palladium is more valuable....



Wanna see a crash? Bc this is how it happens.

[cabmandone]

Make 28 of them and pay off the debt! It's brilliant!

[Aurel]

Originally Posted by cabmando

Make 28 of them and pay off the debt! It's brilliant!

Sure, just have to print the dollars to buy the platinum

[cabmandone]

Platinum shmatinum make em outta cold steel with a platinum coating

[cockerpunk]

i mean the reason why this makes no sense, is that it calls into question the assumed social construct of money as a representation of utility.

except that money doesn't represent utility, or labor, or even value. we agree on some level it does, but it literally doesn't.

[908/930]

No I can not explain, but I thought they already made some out of transparent aluminium, possibly lost those ones, or was it unobtainium?

[flatbutt]

The coin would be held as collateral for the debt? So why not sell several of these to offset the debt? Jeez what with all of the smoke , mirrors and BS it's no wonder we can't see the truth.

[KFC911]

If ya wanna play poker with Tab$ ... ya needs a few coinz

[HobieMarty]

Originally Posted by cabmando

Platinum shmatinum make em outta cold steel with a platinum coating

Kinda like how manufacturers make wheels that have "chrome cladding" which is a plastic chrome cover "bonded", (glued), to a steel or aluminum wheel. This fakery is going to go south eventually.

Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk

[rfuerst911sc]

It reminds me of a street magician , which shell is the ball under ? Hey politicians on both sides you ALL have your hands in this mess . Start paying it down and balance the books !!!!!

[Bill Douglas]

It's just further watering down the value of a USD

Instead of printing money, I guess it's stamping (in a coin press) money.

[LEAKYSEALS951]

[Norm K]

Originally Posted by stevej37

Tabs is the man for this question.

He will arrive shortly.