> this is not an entirely accurate description of the process
This is an entirely inaccurate description of the process. Only countries were allowed to purchase gold for $35 an ounce, with the assumption that they would also "buy" $35 with an ounce of gold. This would ordinarily be considered a bad deal because the dollar had already drastically inflated since 1934, but Europe and Japan were desperate for liquidity to rebuild from WWII, so they were happy to trade physical gold for what was essentially slips of paper. When the US noticed that they were increasingly trying to trade these slips of paper into gold, the US ended the ability to do so. Saying that the end of Bretton Woods was a bad decision is really just saying that you want the US to instantly become bankrupt.
There is no reason to peg your currency to an arbitrary metal. If the government wanted to stop itself from printing money, it would simply stop printing money. Bretton Woods was actually a weaker protection against "printing money" than say a debt ceiling because Nixon was able to reverse kill Bretton Woods single handedly, whereas raising the debt ceiling requires an act from Congress.
This is an entirely inaccurate description of the process. Only countries were allowed to purchase gold for $35 an ounce, with the assumption that they would also "buy" $35 with an ounce of gold. This would ordinarily be considered a bad deal because the dollar had already drastically inflated since 1934, but Europe and Japan were desperate for liquidity to rebuild from WWII, so they were happy to trade physical gold for what was essentially slips of paper. When the US noticed that they were increasingly trying to trade these slips of paper into gold, the US ended the ability to do so. Saying that the end of Bretton Woods was a bad decision is really just saying that you want the US to instantly become bankrupt.
There is no reason to peg your currency to an arbitrary metal. If the government wanted to stop itself from printing money, it would simply stop printing money. Bretton Woods was actually a weaker protection against "printing money" than say a debt ceiling because Nixon was able to reverse kill Bretton Woods single handedly, whereas raising the debt ceiling requires an act from Congress.