Governments Have Been Quietly Shrinking Money For 2,000 Years

Governments were printing money long before money was paper.

Nero cut the silver out of Rome's coins in AD 64 and spent the difference. Henry VIII replaced so much silver with copper that it wore through on his own nose, which is how he got the nickname Old Coppernose. Nixon closed the gold window in 1971. The technology changed every time. The promise did not.

Scott Melker walks two thousand years of debasement and then gives the strongest argument against Bitcoin its full weight, because a flexible currency really does stop bank runs. His conclusion is narrower and harder to dismiss: every discretionary system eventually reaches the point where keeping the promise hurts more than breaking it.

Timestamps
0:04 The technology changes, the promise does not
0:52 Most dollars are never printed at all
2:03 Nero and the silver that quietly left the coin
3:12 China ran paper money well, until war costs arrived
4:00 The king who wore through to the copper
4:23 John Law turns French debt into a bubble
5:33 Not worth a continental
5:59 What Weimar actually teaches
7:38 Nixon closes the gold window
8:53 How money is really created today
10:56 The strongest argument against Bitcoin
12:13 What Bitcoin actually changes
13:30 The promise was always the problem