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yesterday while i was trying to learn the basics of monetary policy for the millionth time, i noticed that the evolution of copywriting on paper money tells a nice little story about how currency became more and more abstracted from actual metal
look closely — the labels on the bill used to form a complete sentence! in 1863 the U.S. started issuing certificates that said "This certifies that there have been deposited in the Treasury of the United States of America TEN DOLLARS in gold coin payable to the bearer on demand"
when the U.S. made it illegal to own gold in 1933, the copy was shortened to "The United States of America will pay to the bearer on demand TEN DOLLARS". no more explicit references to the underlying basis of value
a few years before the U.S. completely abandoned the gold standard, the complete sentence got chopped into two disconnected labels... "The United States of America" and "TEN DOLLARS". it's almost a flex — no need to explicitly state *why* this paper is valuable. it just is
