Launcher said:
The monetary unit of the US was set in the Constiution in 1789. The U.S. Coinage Act of 1792 enforced it. Legal tender laws are only necessary to force people to accept something with no intrinsic value in payment of debt. Nobody has to twist your arm to accept something with intrinsic value in payment of debt. Paper currency makes legal tender laws necessary.
I think where I am having problems with this is how intrinsic is defined. There is nothing inherently more valuable about gold than there is dollars at this point. When it was first done, I agree, Legal Tender laws were used to twist the arms. Is that because gold is intrinsically more valuable than the dollar? No, again, nothing has intrinsic value other than those things necessary to survival. The fact that a dollar can buy a certain amount of gold on the world market proves that one is just as valuable as the other. I could use an ounce of gold to buy that 125 gallon tank or a few $100 bills. Intrinsic means related to the essential nature of something. Gold is not intrinsically valuable. Again, it is only worth what someone is willing to give you for it in trade. Here, let's set up another meeting, but let's manipulate the circumstances, okay?
You can have all the gold, silver, platinum and titanium in the world plus the sole ability to mine it, manipulate it and shape it. I'll take all of the food and ability to produce it. Now, we eradicate modern life as we know it; I'll be kind and let you pick the catastrophe of your choice.

So, most of the population of Earth is gone. You have all that gold which you claim is inherently valuable. I have more cans of food than you can shake a stick at. What is your gold worth now? $440.50? Maybe. But when you get hungry it's only worth what I am willing to trade you for it. Are you seeing the point? Market value is just that. In order for there to be a value, there has to be a market for it, therefore it is not intrinsically valuable at all.