The U.S. dollar originally was defined April 2, 1792 as as a unit of weight equaling 371 4/16th grains (24.057 grams) of pure silver, or 416 grains of standard silver (standard silver being defined as 1485 parts fine silver to 179 parts alloy). By that definition, with silver currently at $46.80 / troy ounce, the current dollar is worth 0.0165264423076923 of what it was, or just under 2 cents of what it was originally.

:faint:

Do you have some sort of historical graph that shows its decline (in relation to silver)? It would interesting to know if it was a stead decline or if it dipped significantly during specific periods.

Do you have some sort of historical graph that shows its decline (in relation to silver)? It would interesting to know if it was a stead decline or if it dipped significantly during specific periods.

It has had peaks and valleys. Silver was $7 and ounce only a few years ago. Here is a link to historical charts.

Historical Silver Data and Charts - London Fix (http://www.kitco.com/charts/historicalsilver.html)

http://www.kitco.com/LFgif/ag792-999.gif


London Fix Historical gold - result (http://www.kitco.com/scripts/hist_charts/yearly_graphs.plx)

http://www.kitco.com/LFgif/ag792-999.gif


London Fix Historical gold - result (http://www.kitco.com/scripts/hist_charts/yearly_graphs.plx)

Hard to tell from that chart, but it seems the last 10 years or so are missing. And the big spike around 1980 is pretty telling about - possibly - the Carter admin.

Hard to tell from that chart, but it seems the last 10 years or so are missing. And the big spike around 1980 is pretty telling about - possibly - the Carter admin.

You can pick certain periods. There is one that spans 1985-2011.