Since that time, and more rapidly after 1850, gold has displaced silver as the standard money.

In a higher degree than any other one material, gold has the qualities of a good standard for rich and industrially developed communities.

England for a long period practically has had gold as its standard money; the United States since 1834 (except for the period of paper money from 1862 to 1879); France since about 1879, having shifted gradually from silver, after 1855, under the working of the bimetallic law; Germany since 1873; and Japan since the later nineties.

Other countries have been striving to attain it.

Since about 1890 some states (including Mexico) and some of the colonial possessions of the great nations (including India and the Philippines) have adopted the plan of "the gold-exchange standard." By this plan gold is the standard price unit, while silver continues to be used all but exclusively as the material in circulation, its amount being controlled and its value regulated on principles to be explained below under coinage, seigniorage, and foreign exchange.