Why I Use The Liberty Dollar - 2002

Jason Pratt

My wife thinks I'm nuts. Oh sure, she carries a one ounce $10 Silver Liberty in her wallet, but I think she's just doing it to humor me. I've never seen her try to spend it.

My father-in-law wonders if I'm a criminal. I gave him the whole pitch, explained the whole currency system to him, and still he says he's waiting for the Secret Service to call him to serve as my character witness.

But that's OK. I take it in stride. I'm not going to stop using the Liberty Dollar. I'm just having too much fun.

I spend it everywhere I go. I never get tired of putting the Liberty Dollar on the counter or into a merchant's hand and watching the reaction. Sure, I get a twinge of the all-too-human fear of rejection at the moment of truth, and yet I go on.

Sometimes the money gets rejected, and I just shrug and pull out a credit card or Federal Reserve Notes. But about nine times out of ten, it gets accepted. Sometimes it gets better: I make that person's day. I've given them something valuable, something different, and something new to look at. I’ve broken up the monotony of making change all day long. And, hopefully, I’ve given them a quick education on the true nature of money. Maybe they even have some fun with it.

It feels great to use the Liberty Dollar. I enjoy the tiny thrill, the realization that I'm doing good for the country, and the assurance that it's legal and moral.

The Liberty Dollar is issued and distributed into the economy by people like me, who sign up as Redemption Centers to get the currency at a discount, perform or coordinate redemption to silver for local merchants and individuals, and so on.

The Liberty Dollar itself is silver backed, meaning every $1 certificate (legally a warehouse receipt) is backed by 1/10 ounce of pure silver (at the current $10 Silver Base) that resides in a warehouse in Idaho. You can send the certificates in to the National Fulfillment Office and redeem them for silver. In other words, it's honest money. The kind that the Secret Service doesn't worry about.

The Liberty Dollar goal is to educate enough people about the true nature of money that America can side-step the looming monetary crisis being created by the mounting National Debt and the Trade Balance. The Liberty Dollar is a peaceful petition and an educational tool for those who want sound money and a return to a debt free economy.

But why should you use it? Why should you open your wallet right now, take out some US dollar (Federal Reserve Notes) and exchange them for Liberty Dollars? The obvious reason is that the Liberty Dollar is a sound money, so it will protect your purchasing power plus you can profit from inflation with higher silver prices. Our Federal Reserve Notes are just debt. These are the reasons I would give you:

• It’s fun. You'll have shopkeepers asking lots of questions, friends gathering around to see the currency, and you can become an expert on money. All by getting involved with and learning about The Liberty Dollar. As Dr. Seuss wrote many years ago in The Cat In The Hat, "It's fun to have fun, but you have to know how."
• It’s profitable. You can actually earn money (just like the banks do) by putting The Liberty Dollar into circulation.
• The Liberty Dollar is private, free-market money that is devoid of manipulation, inflation, and debt. It's a currency of the people, for the people, and by the people. It's a sound, honest money that is voluntary, and everyone should feel positive about that.
• It does not cause our national debt to go up when you use it. In contrast, every Federal Reserve Note created adds to our national debt.
• It unites people: liberals, conservatives, minorities, libertarians, and even Greens are enthusiastic about the Liberty Dollar. (In fact, about the only people who don't like it are bankers.) Anything with appeal that broad must be good.
• It helps local economies thrive and prosper. Liberty Dollars spent in your community tend to stay in your community, because the big banks often won't take them. In contrast, Federal Reserve Notes tend to get sucked out of your community by banks or big box retailers. Ever wonder why currency traders in New York City have such high incomes?
• It's backed by real silver, so not only can you redeem it for silver, you know that its quantity is limited, and therefore it's inflation-proof. It's even designed so that when the price of silver goes up, the value of the currency is adjusted accordingly. If you want the specifics, go to www.libertydollar.org and read about what happens to the Liberty Dollar when silver goes over $10 per ounce.
• It's fair. An explicit contract printed on every certificate tells you exactly what you're getting when you hold the currency. That's what we should expect from Federal Reserve Notes, but we aren't getting it.
• It helps educate people about money, a topic that most people have a very loose grasp on. The facts about money are simple, but they have somehow become complex over the years as we moved away from the basics. If the goal of the "paper economy" is to confuse the average person to facilitate robbing him blind, it's succeeding wildly.

Those are the reasons I give people for using the Liberty Dollar. Is it perfect? No. The perfect currency would be measured only by weight (like the Krugerrand or the Mexican Libertad), and would not have a legal tender value printed or stamped onto it. And the perfect currency would have a perfect banking system to accept and store it. (Right now, those of us who use the Liberty Dollar have to keep it in circulation and pretty much out of the banks, a minor inconvenience that will be rectified as soon as enough people start using the currency.)

But today, right now, The Liberty Dollar works 1-for-1 alongside Federal Reserve Notes, so they are easier for people to use and accept than a weight-based currency would be. Start using and accepting the Liberty Dollar, it is fun.

If you are not using the Liberty Dollar now, you are not doing everything you could be doing to put the world back on track to an honest money system. You're not doing your best to help the price of silver. And you're missing out on the profits others are getting for using real silver in the marketplace. And of course, because you're not using the Liberty Dollar, you're not having as much fun as I am.

Jason Pratt operates Austin Silver Center (www.austinsilver.com). He can be reached via e-mail at jason@austinsilver.com. Jason lives with his wife and daughter in Austin, TX, and was a Libertarian Party candidate for office in 2002.)