countries suggest that the gold standard was intended as a contingent rule. By that, we mean that the authorities could … temporarily abandon the fixed price of gold during a wartime emergency on the understanding that convertibility at the original … price of gold would be restored when the emergency passed. …

By the early 1960s, outstanding U.S. dollar liabilities began to exceed the U.S. gold stock, suggesting that the United … States could not completely maintain its pledge to convert dollars into gold at the official price. This raised uncertainty … operations often forestalled gold losses, but in so doing, delayed the need to solve Bretton Woods’ fundamental underlying …