currency_exchange Monetary Theory

Study of money and its role in economy

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"In countries where money is plentiful, all other things being equal, a greater quantity of money is given for goods and services than where money is scarce. Whence it follows that money itself, like any other commodity, is worth more where it is scarce than where it is abundant."

Azpilcueta, Martín de event 1556

menu_book Comentario Resolutorio de Cambios (Commentary on Exchange)

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"We see by experience that in France, where money is scarcer than in Spain, bread, wine, cloth, and labour are worth much less. And even in Spain, before the discovery of the Indies, goods and labour were much cheaper than they are today, for the reason that there was then much less money."

Azpilcueta, Martín de event 1556

menu_book Comentario Resolutorio de Cambios (Commentary on Exchange)

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"A sum of money today is worth more than the same sum to be received in the future. This is not only the common estimation of men, but is grounded in reason: present goods are available for present needs; future goods must be awaited, and in the meantime their possession is uncertain."

Azpilcueta, Martín de event 1556

menu_book Comentario Resolutorio de Cambios (Commentary on Exchange)

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"I don't believe that we shall ever have good money again before we take the thing out of the hands of government. Because we can't take them violently out of the hands of government, all we can do is by some sly or round-about way introduce something they can't stop."

Hayek, Friedrich event 1984

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"What difference does it make whether a man is despoiled of his fortune openly and by force, or secretly, by stealth — whether through a bandit on the road or through a prince who debases the currency by which all things are measured?"

Mariana, Juan de event 1599

menu_book De Rege et Regis Institutione (On the King and the Royal Institution)

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"Money has not been generated by law. In its origin it is a social, and not a state institution. Sanction by the authority of the state is a notion alien to it."

Menger, Carl event 1892

menu_book On the Origin of Money

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auto_stories Books

An Essay on the Nature of Trade in General

person Cantillon, Richard event 1755

Pioneering work in economic theory written around 1730, covering entrepreneurship, market pricing, monetary economics, and the circular flow, consi...

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The Ethics of Money Production

person Hülsmann, Jörg Guido event 2008

Analysis of the moral implications of money production, arguing that fiat money and fractional reserve banking involve moral hazards and violate pr...

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On the Origin of Money

person Menger, Carl event 1892

Menger's influential essay explaining how money emerged spontaneously from barter as the most marketable commodity, without need for government dec...

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Treatise on the Origin, Nature, Law, and Alterations of Money

person Oresme, Nicole event 1355

Medieval treatise criticizing currency debasement and government manipulation of money, one of the earliest works in monetary economics

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person Authors

Cantillon, Richard

Irish-French economist and author of Essai sur la Nature du Commerce en Général, pioneer in economic theory

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Hülsmann, Jörg Guido

German economist and Professor at the University of Angers, specialist in Austrian economics and monetary theory

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Oresme, Nicole

French philosopher and economist, bishop of Lisieux, early critic of currency debasement and pioneer in economic thought

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psychology Concepts

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The Cantillon Effect

The Cantillon Effect is an economic concept explaining how newly created money does not affect everyone equally. When new money enters the economy,...

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