money money money

David Graeber examines the centrality of debt to the origin of money.

Finance was linked to violence thousands of years before the Islamic State proposed its own currency.

We know far less than we think we do. (There's a lot we can learn from the financial crisis of July 1914. And we haven't yet.

From the very start, England's 17th century colonies in America had a problem -- a shortage of coins [D94, T01] The British idea was to grow large amounts of tobacco, cut timber for the ships of their global navy and merchant marine, and so forth, sending in return the supplies they felt were needed to keep the Americans working. In effect, early colonists were supposed to both work for the company and shop at the company store. The investors and the Crown much preferred this to paying in coin what the farmers might ask, letting the farmers themselves buy the supplies -- and, heaven forbid, keep some of the profit as well.

Within three years unemployment was banished and Germany’s economy was flourishing.

Ever wonder where the tradition of throwing coins into wishing wells originated? Well, read on and wonder no more! (Ever thrown a coin into a fountain & made a wish?

Money. When we think of money, we Americans and many around the world think of a special piece of paper, usually with a politicians face printed on it and covered with a number telling the owner of that bill what value it would represent did we still have a commodity backed currency. However, how did we end up using money, or, indirect exchange, in the economy?

Since the fall of the Bretton Woods monetary regime in 1971 and the double-digit inflation that followed, investors have considered gold a hedge against inflation and a check against central banks who have the capacity to resort to money printing and currency devaluation as a means of decreasing the burden of public debt and encouraging export growth. But while gold often thrives in inflationary environments, it's really a bet against something far worse than inflation. After all, run-of-the-mill stocks, real estate, or even inflation-protected government bonds can protect you against against a decline in the real value of government-issued currencies. But for many investors all over the world, gold is a great protector against much more severe events than 1970s-style inflation, like war or prolonged depression.