The recent rise of dollar, pound, and euro inflation rates has rekindled the debate over potential alternative monies, particularly gold and Bitcoin. Though Bitcoin has been much discussed in recent years, a basic understanding of how it and gold would work as monetary standards is rare....

Some economists have argued theoretically that the private minting of circulating precious metal coins would be inefficient: Due to information asymmetry, money-users would be chronically victimized by low-quality or underweight coins. An examination of experience with private mints during gold...