[Hallicrafters] inflation

Fri May 30 15:30:45 EDT 2008

Roger,

Let's see now, using my minor in Mathematics from the University of MI, ten 
percent of nothing is ... Hmmm. Then another ten percent of that nothing 
equals ... Who was it that said it was not worth the paper it was printed on 
anyhow? (LOL!)

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Roger (K8RI)" <hallicraftersgroup at rogerhalstead.com>
To: "Duane Fischer, W8DBF" <dfischer at usol.com>
Cc: <hallicrafters at mailman.qth.net>; "Peter Markavage" <manualman at juno.com>
Sent: Friday, May 30, 2008 3:23 AM
Subject: Re: [Hallicrafters] inflation

> Hi Duane and all,
>
> Duane Fischer, W8DBF wrote:
>> Peter,
>>
>> Remember the United States went off the gold standard about 1974! Prior 
>> to that, the treasury had to have an equal amount of Silver in reserve to 
>> mint dimes, quarters and half dollars, as well as paper Silver 
>> Certificates. The treasury also had to have an equal amount of gold in 
>> reserve to back all the paper money printed. Since the United States had 
>> a fixed per Troy ounce price of gold, and the rest of the world had 
>> dropped their fixed price, the USA had to drop the fixed price of gold, 
>> and drop the gold and silver standard system altogether, so the value of 
>> our gold was the same as it was in other countries.
>>
>> I do not recall the exact value, but the USA was at about $44 per troy 
>> ounce for Gold and the rest of the world was double or triple!
>>
> I think the figure was $37
>
>> When this happened, our coins and paper money were no longer backed by 
>> "cash on hand" or you can only mint and print coins and bills equal to 
>> the gold and silver value in the treasury! We used the GNP and all sorts 
>> of other worthless devices to give the worthless coins and bills "value".
>>
> IRRC the Government only needs to back 10% of what they give to the banks. 
> The Banks only need to back 10% of what they give to us.
>
> 73
>
> Roger (K8RI)
>> The only coin worth face value after the .90% Silver was removed from the 
>> dime, quarter and half dollar starting with January of 1965, was the 
>> Lincoln Memorial Cent. The penny was actually worth a penny!
>>
>> When people saw this coming, guess what? The Lincoln Wheat Cent of 1909 
>> through 1958 and the Lincoln Memorial Cent of 1958 through 1961, weighed 
>> 4.11 grams. It consisted of 95% Copper and 5% Tin and Zinc. Then in 1962, 
>> they left the 95% Copper alone, but used most Zinc with a little Tin! The 
>> weight of the coin dropped slightly, but it still contained 95% Copper.
>>
>> Then as Copper rose in value, the treasury changed the Lincoln Memorial 
>> Cent again in 1982. Now they removed all but 4.6% of the Copper! The 
>> penny now contained 95.4% Zinc and a little Tin! The weight dropped a lot 
>> this time. Hence, the Copper penny was now not only worth less then a 
>> penny, it was worthless!
>>
>> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Peter Markavage" <manualman at juno.com>
>> To: <hallicrafters at mailman.qth.net>
>> Sent: Thursday, May 29, 2008 10:43 PM
>> Subject: Re: [Hallicrafters] inflation
>>
>>
>>> The value of a printed stamp, in this case 5 cents, doesn't change with
>>> inflation. If they printed a 5 cent today, it's value is still 5 cents. 
>>> I
>>> will agree that the paper and printing costs have gone up from 1965 to
>>> 2008 but the value of the stamp in real dollars (or cents in this case)
>>> hasn't changed. What has changed is what you can "buy" for 5 cents today
>>> verses what you could buy for 5 cents in 1965. Same goes for money. A 5
>>> dollar bill in 1965 is still a 5 dollar bill in 2008 unless of course 
>>> you
>>> have one where Lincoln's portrait is printed upside down or some other
>>> strange rare printing anomaly.
>>>
>>> Pete, wa2cwa
>>> http://www.manualman.com
>>>
>>>
>>> On Thu, 29 May 2008 11:47:56 -0700 <lrlayton at cox.net> writes:
>>>> Those 5 cent amateur radio stamps stamps from 1965 would cost around
>>>> 35 cents in todays money. A Hallicrafters SX-117 that sold for $379
>>>> in 1965 would be a whopping  $2584.70  now,  and todays gas at $4.00
>>>> would be equivalent to  59 cents a gallon back then. The problem is
>>>> that the dollar just isn't worth much these days!
>>>>
>>>> These numbers are from the governments own inflation calculator at
>>>> http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> ---- Peter Markavage <manualman at juno.com> wrote:
>>>> > I still have several 3 cent stamps (I think they had the Statue
>>>> of
>>>> > Liberty on them) that I've never used. Plus, I still have a bunch
>>>> of
>>>> > unused 5 cent Amateur Radio stamps that they issued "back in the
>>>> good old
>>>> > days".
>>>> >
>>>> > I also have a refund check for 10 cents issued by the U. S.
>>>> Government to
>>>> > some Private in the Army back in 1951 or 52. It's amazing the
>>>> things you
>>>> > find stuck in the pages of old manuals.
>>>> >
>>>> > Pete, wa2cwa
>>>> > http://www.manualman.com
>>>> >
>>>> >
>>>> ______________________________________________________________
>>>>
>>>>
>>> ____________________________________________________________
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>>
>> ______________________________________________________________
>>
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>
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