Padrão ouro

No seguimento de uma conversa de há tempos dos small-brothers, sobre o porquê da escolha do ouro em concreto como padrão monetários, aqui fica um interessante excerto do Human Action, de Ludwig von Mises, disponível online, não sobre a génese da escolha, mas com interessantes considerações sobre a sua consolidação, evolução e importância:

Men have chosen the precious metals gold and silver for the money service on account of their mineralogical, physical, and chemical features. The use of money in a market economy is a praxeologically necessary fact. That gold--and not something else--is used as money is merely a historical fact and as such cannot be conceived by catallactics. In monetary history too, as in all other branches of history, one must resort to historical understanding. If one takes pleasure in calling the gold standard a "barbarous relic," one cannot object to the application of the same term to every historically determined institution.