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With the gold standard you will have a currency which will present you with a much harder market. Your exports will be weakened by having your currency tied to a limited resource, as opposed to being tied as it currently is, to the free market.
With your exports weakening you will find that imports will be cheaper, your competitors will, due to the full free market proposed by Ron Paul, push American businesses under leading to the mass of Americans going broke.
This was the effect noted back when you were on the gold standard, the only real difference is that where then you had an essentially protectionist government, under Paul you would have a government offering you zilch.
Further, as the market becomes more hostile your businesses will be driven to cutting more corners of safety, health and environmental protections. Without a strong government there to prevent the worst of those excesses, expect the quality of your goods to plummet to standards that make the Chinese look prissy.
Further, what little federal government you will have left, will be rendered ineffective in part by its sudden loss of authority, but also by the massive corruption that a Ron Paul government will bring in.
With the emphasis being placed on smaller government you will get less oversight, job security will no longer prove a deterrent to corruption, and those you have in government will tend towards being more corruptable, seen as they see "Personal responsibility" as being the defining trait of America. You have already had a taste of this from the current crop of very conservative Republicans you have in office now.
Changing the tax code over to a flat tax and eliminating the IRS will breed a period of chaos in which government's tax collection will drop dramatically, to the point where for the first five years you may as well ignore tax as a source of revenue. This is universal to all major tax system changes.
The new system will inhibit new businesses. This is due to the fact that while businesses only get taxed on taxable profits under the current system (The definitions of what expenses you can claim and what income you don't have to form the bulk of your tax code,) under a sales tax system all businesses will be taxed. Most new businesses take two years to start making profits.
Ron Paul will further weaken America's public education system by allowing it to revert to the states. This will lead to the North-Eastern states widening their current lead on the South when it comes to education, and the South being religated to being a third world hellhole.
Oh yeah and you guys from the South who moan and groan about taxes? Well, under Ron Paul those taxes will go away and your economy will collapse. Why? Because it is the wealthy North-East that actually is contributing the most towards America's federal budget, and you guys who are taking the most.
Thankfully, I am not running for president so I am allowed to point out that of the red states, only four aren't bums and stiffs on a federal level. You guys are reliant on the Fed dollar.
On foreign policy, America will improve a whole lot when it comes to war, but your withdrawal from the UN, coupled with your new trade policies will prove detrimental to your ability to promote your trade interests.
As a major upshot of a Ron Paul presidency the bulk of your comparitively worthless foreign bases in nations which do not need nor want them, will be shut down saving you a fortune in your military expenditure for very little loss in terms of real power.
Terrorism will remain stable, as though you will have "Less" military might, it will likely be better focussed. Frankly, the question of whether you need bases in Japan and Germany has been unasked for too long. South Korea may suffer but then, no foreign policy is perfect.
Your presence in hornet hive states like Israel will be toned back, reducing anti-American sentiment.
Unfortunately, your domestic economic crisis, and general collapse, will mean that the fruits of such change will go unnoticed, as America will cease to be a super-power.
