Richard J Murphy - 50 years without gold backed money -
Ask most people what gives money its value and they will most likely say that it is gold. There's still a popular belief that if you take a £20 note into the Bank of England that they have to swap it with gold from the vaults, if you ask very nicely. But that's not true. There's been no link between the pound and gold for 50 years now. All that has given money its value since 1971 is the promise that the government makes that it is literally worth the value that it gives it, which it honours by accepting that money in payment of tax. That's a big thing for most people to get their heads around. This is the first of a series of four videos that looks at how that works - and why.
ABOUT RICHARD MURPHY
Richard Murphy is a chartered accountant. After training with what is now KPMG he established his a firm of accountants in London, of which he was subsequently senior partner, in parallel with a career as an entrepreneur and company director which lasted until his early 40s. He then moved to a career in campaigning and academia. He co-founded the Tax Justice Network in 2003, the Green New Deal in 2008, the Fair Tax Mark in 2013 and the Corporate Accountability Network in 2019. From 2015 to 2020 he was Professor of Practice in International Political Economy at City, University of London and is now Visiting Professor of Accounting at Sheffield University Management School. His best known book is 'The Joy of Tax'.
Follow Richard on his Twitter: www.twitter.com/RichardJMurphy or on his blog: http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/
Recorded at Spotted in Studios
http://www.youtube.com/c/SpottedinStudios