How about $1,190 silver?

How often have you read that the paper dollar has lost over 98 percent of its value since 1913?

I know I have seen it many times.

Let’s look forward.

1913 is 103 years ago. Let’s go forward 108 years to 2124.

What will the paper U.S. dollar be worth then?

It will be of concern to people who have not even been born.

The financial crisis of 2008 will look like the Panic of 1907 looks to us now.

If you are wondering why I am looking forward 108 years rather than 103 years or even 100 years, it is because it makes the math so much easier.

Inflation since 1913 has run at roughly 4 percent a year, including times of world wars, smaller wars and depressions.

If we presume that the future will resemble the past and inflation averages 4 percent during the next 108 years, where will that put the value of the paper U.S. dollar?

In 2024, prices will be 64 times what they are today.

In other words, the dollar will be worth 1.5625 cents from the year 2016.

The price of gold this morning also makes the math easier.

It was a nice round figure of $1,300 an ounce when I checked the Kitco website.

If gold simply maintains the same inflation adjusted value that it has this morning, the price on Nov. 2, 2024, will be $83,200 an ounce.

For silver, this morning’s price is $18.59.

In 108 years it will be $1,189.76 an ounce.

Even when you know that purchasing power is unchanged, such large numbers for bullion almost make you want to drool.

Median income will be $3,617,024.

Today’s is roughly $56,516.

Minimum wage will be $464 an hour.

The national debt will go from a rounded $20 trillion, which is 20 followed by 12 zeroes to:

1,280,000,000,000,000.

I did not even know what 1,280 trillion is called.

I looked it up. It is quadrillion. That makes sense.

It is a good thing technology will replace paper checks.

Mine have no room to write so many zeroes.

Buzz blogger Dave Harper has twice won the Numismatic Literary Guild Award for Best Blog and is editor of the weekly newspaper "Numismatic News."

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