Was US Dollar ever backed by gold and silver?

Yes. Nixon took us off the gold standard.

[mod says]: removed off-topic response; as a gentle reminder, please use PM feature as appropriate-thanks.

off topic warning
lol, its better than him not posting the reason and us thinking you were putting up porn, right chica? : P

As for the question, I see some places where the gold standard was abolished in 1933 and other where it was done by Nixon in ‘72.

What am i missing?

@fireside: We did not quite get off the gold standard back then in 1933. Gold Coins were withdrawn from circulation, and the standard was reduced from 23.22 grains to 13.71 grains per dollar.

Nixon took us off the gold standard in ‘71 I thought? Either way it was Nixon in the ‘70’s.

@La_Chica_Gomela: see ^^—the part in between the [ ]

I could’ve PMd you I suppose, hopefully you can see it’s just my job not a privilege; I take no pleasure in taking down a comment btw.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_standard
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silver_certificate

I actually have a Silver Certificate dollar bill; it looks like a regular dollar bill except part of it is printed in silver-ish ink.

Isn’t it the blue print. The gold certificate is red I think? The reserve was taking all of these out of circulation. I would def. hang on to it.

Please take this conversation private. Thanks.

http://www.fluther.com/disc/5797/why-should-the-dollar-be-backed-by-gold/

The next to last post from that thread is an amazing explanation for what is going on right now. It was written by Maudie.

@snd, critter: If you look, a GC will have a gold DoT seal on it, and a SC will have blue. That’s on ones. Once you get into bigger bills, the color of the bills changes as well. The $100k is largely gold.

The $100K notes weren’t just largely gold, they were only printed in 1934 and were 100% gold certificates.

Boy this conversation gets interrupted a lot!
I can’t recall, but before Nixon, weren’t US Bills printed with something like “exchangeable for yyoz of…”?

They were exchangable for the dollar amount of gold or silver.

I remember seeing and using silver certificates. They looked the same as the Federal Reserve Notes (until other colors were added for security), the seals on the Silver Certificates were blue, and they said something to the effect: Pay to the bearer on demand One Dollar (or whatever the amount) in silver.

Wasn’t in the 60’s? I know they stopped minting 90% silver for circulation in 1964 after Kennedy.

They don’t back it with anything anymore so the governments don’t have to operate on a budget but we do.
Why can’t I pay my taxes with a credit card?
I’m good for it :)

Until the Nixon administration screwed it all up and before them the IRS and the unratified 16th Amendment in 1913.

I think we went off the gold standard because the money supply has to expand as the totality of goods and services expands. In short, the gold standard puts the country in a monetary straight-jacket.

The action was taken on the advice of leading economists.