When the people of Earth Died off most of them left behind the trappings
of the things that represented wealth in their society. It is interesting to note that
many people who knew that their fate had been sealed and they had only a
short time to live spent a good deal of that time in protecting their valuables.
They put valuables in safes, safety deposit boxes and on occasion just took
them out and buried them. The new people exploring the old cities almost
never found rare coins or jewels, just lying around. This presented a real
problem for the people of the new society.
Most people realized that such items had no value but they still could
now resist picking up a shiny piece of jewelry or a coin for that matter. Many
people made a hobby of scavenger hunting or breaking into old safes and
strong boxes and removing the contents. As time went by and the new
population fanned out around the globe it became more and more difficult to
find such items. They generally used welding equipment to get into safes and
extract the contents. The items themselves gradually regained some value and
people began using them for barter.
One of the mathematicians calculated that if there had been twelve
Billion people and they had each had an average of one hundred items of
treasure there would be twelve hundred billion formerly valuable items left on
the planet. An average of two thousand six hundred items for every person
now on the Earth. That did not count the coins that were in common circulation.
Since they were being disproportionately allocated to the people that sought
them out many people soon accumulated tens of thousands of these trappings.
This is the idea that finally emerged. People were allowed to keep any of
them that they wanted to keep. But a committee was empowered to assign a
credit value to each item or type of item and almost ten thousand workers were
trained as appraisers. Anyone who turned in such items to a central collection
point would be awarded the appraised value of the item in additional credits to
their accounts. These valuables would then be placed in the vaults of Fort Knox
with all the gold that was found there.
Under this system a one ounce gold coin was accepted for five hundred
credits. Diamonds would bring about one thousand credits per carrot. Some
people started making an effort to locate these items and turn them in others
made an effort to find them and keep them for a rainy day while others just
ignored the whole proposition. Most elected to just turn in the things they found
but didn't go out of their way looking for them. One faction looked at as robbing
the dead and wouldn't even pick an item up if they came across it.
At Fort Knox finished jewelery was kept in one location, rare coins in
another, finished diamonds in another and gold coins in another. As fewer and
fewer items flowed in prices paid rose and the barter value of these items within
the economy rose proportionately. Eventually the Government opened
Jewelery stores and offered these items for sale to the public. Engagement and
wedding bands proved to be very popular.
In this way a planetary reserve was built up and whether the Government
realized it or not the credit's became backed by the Planetary reserve at Fort
Knox. This made a lot of people feel more secure knowing that their
accumulated credits were backed by something.
For the sake of convenience ordinary minted coins were eventually put
back into circulation and were sold by the Treasury at the rate of one credit for
one dollar in change. Foreign coins not minted by the United States were never
put back into circulation but were sold by the jewelery stores, for a nominal
price, as souvenirs. Most of the paper money was discriminating but what
when sound paper money was found choice specimens were preserved to
eventually be displayed in museums. The coin supply lasted for almost two
hundred years before the coins became so worn that they were no longer
recognizable. At that point the Government started minting new coins in the
same denominations but of a new design.
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