system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
How did currency backed by gold/silver work? Why was it discontinued?
gpt
At some points in time you could literally trade the notes for metal. Then (often during a war) governments would suspend that because they needed to create a lot of cash. 
The reason that nobody does it anymore is because the price of the metal can swing wildly which can absolutely kick your economy’s butt. Imagine the fed trying to cool off the economy and everyone’s cash goes up 20 percent in value over the weekend because the price of gold changed. Or the fed is trying to stimulate and the value of everyone’s cash drops. 
Some people say things like “we are gonna go back to the gold standard” if they actually mean it literally then they are absolutely clueless about economics. We have had some  bank nominees lately who seem to believe it literally smh.