According to the World Gold Council, the "golden constant" is reflected in the fact that an ounce of gold was worth a "mid-range outfit of clothing" in the 14th Century, in the late 18th Century, and in the first few years of the 21st Century. The price of that outfit in fiat currency, by contrast, has increased many times over.

Our fear is that the limitations of our current system of fiat money will become increasingly obvious over the coming months and years. Yet we are optimistic that, as it does so, the search will intensify for better alternatives (including to gold, given its limitations as a currency).

Silver money can claim a 5,000-year history. Gold money did not make its first appearance until two millennia later around 550 BC when, according to Herodotus, the Ancient Greek 'father of history', the King of Lydia (in modern day Turkey) started minting coins made of it.

Bitcoin, invented by a mysterious figure, Satoshi Nakomoto, whose true identity is the subject of many a conspiracy theory, experienced even more of a rollercoaster ride than gold in 2011, soaring in value from less than $1 a bitcoin to almost $30, before plunging below $5. Many thought that this apparent bursting of a bitcoin bubble would put an e

I think it's as clear as the nose on my face that the fiscal path we're on is simply not sustainable. And when I'm asked to describe the situation we face, to me, it's always like a cancer, and it's a cancer that truly is going to destroy this country from within." This was not some crazed right-wing extremist speaking, nor even Alan Simpson,

"coin clipping"

Maybe innovators in the private sector will produce some entirely new form of money that is not dependent on government at all.

Inflation has been an economic taboo since the 1970s but maybe not for much longer. Government and citizens alike are now much more indebted than they were at the start of the Great Depression. In such circumstances, inflation could come to seem positively desirable, especially for borrowers, as it would erode the value of their debts in real terms

Today, gold bugs talk about gold having been money for millennia, which is actually rather misleading. For most of human history, the metal that was typically used as money was silver. By contrast, gold was too rare to be widely used in a liquid market (a necessary condition for a commodity to be money). Silver was more abundant and deposits of it