Judy Shelton, Trump’s Next Fed Choice, Favors a Gold Standard and Free Trade
The comments below are an edited and abridged synopsis of an article by Mike Shedlock
Economist Judy Shelton, a Trump economic advisor and a gold standard advocate, is rumored to be Trump’s next Fed pick, as reported by Bloomberg.
She’s currently US executive director for the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and she previously worked for the Sound Money Project, which was founded to promote awareness about monetary stability and financial privacy.
On April 21, Shelton had an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, “The Case for Monetary Regime Change,” in which she supported the gold standard:
“But it is wholly legitimate, and entirely prudent, to question the infallibility of the Fed in calibrating the money supply to the needs of the economy. No other government institution had more influence over the creation of money and credit in the lead-up to the devastating 2008 global meltdown. And the Fed’s response to the meltdown may have exacerbated the damage by lowering the incentive for banks to fund private-sector growth.” Shelton concluded, “Central bankers, and their defenders, have proven less than omniscient.”
Shedlock believes that Shelton would have been a better choice for Fed chair than Powell, Bernanke, Yellen, or Greenspan. She is the author of the 1998 book, Money Meltdown.
The Fed has produced three consecutive bubbles, each bigger than the one before it. The only reason the latest bubble is not acknowledged is that it hasn’t yet burst; Shelton seems to be headed in the right direction.
Clearly Trump is fighting the wrong battle when it comes to trade. Tariffs will not fix the alleged problems of currency manipulation; a gold standard would.