The Bullion Committee was set up in order to research the possibility of putting Britain onto the

gold standard A gold standard is a monetary system in which the standard economic unit of account is based on a fixed quantity of gold. The gold standard was the basis for the international monetary system from the 1870s to the early 1920s, and from the l ...

and how to carry it out.

Sir Robert Peel Sir Robert Peel, 2nd Baronet, (5 February 1788 – 2 July 1850) was a British Conservative statesman who served twice as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1834–1835 and 1841–1846) simultaneously serving as Chancellor of the Exchequer ...

was the chairman of the committee. He managed to put sterling on the gold standard two years earlier than planned. Other members were

David Ricardo David Ricardo (18 April 1772 – 11 September 1823) was a British political economist. He was one of the most influential of the classical economists along with Thomas Malthus, Adam Smith and James Mill. Ricardo was also a politician, and a ...

and Jeremiah Harman Esq. The effects of the return to the gold standard were not without controversy. Industrialists complained that full employment had been sacrificed to sound money. Thomas Attwood claimed 'Peels Act' created 'more misery, more poverty, more discord, more of everything that was calamitous to the nation, except death, than Attila caused in the Roman Empire'.

References

Economic history of the United Kingdom Gold standard {{UK-hist-stub

See also

References