I'm fairly sure that's not accurate. Source for "most" economies not having money?
It would appear based on some simple googling that "money" has existed in many cultures going back 30,000 years, in two forms: "money of account" and "money of exchange". Of both of those they have taken various forms. Minted coins did not appear until around 3,000 years ago.
What is the best evidence for this historically? Anthropologists strongly dispute this idea, and believe barter was mostly used for trade between total strangers (e.g. traders from outside your society or "economy")
Graeber's Debt: the first 5000 years covers this topic
> What is the best evidence for this historically?
Mostly archeological. There are many burials that contain items that were clearly not locally sourced. In some cases, they had to be transported for thousands of kilometers.
And quite often this was done for non-functional items such as jewelry or dyes.
Er... Money has existed for thousands of years, and has replaced barter in any society with even moderate amounts of specialization, and a population size that gets into the thousands. In Roman times, this was already the case for thousands of years. Money is one of the great enablers of trade and specialization, of empire building. Barter economy cannot sustain any of that, because barter economy does not scale. Money is a relatively recent invention in the time scale of our species existence, but that's still 3-4 thousand years of near-ubiquitous use, minimum.
Was there money in pre-1778 Hawaii? Not that I have been able to figure out. I believe it was a gift economy.
There certainly was specialization in Hawaii, and with a population of over 100,000 would seem like a good counter-example.
> Barter economy cannot sustain any of that, because barter economy does not scale.
From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_money , "There is no evidence, historical or contemporary, of a society in which barter is the main mode of exchange;[23] instead, non-monetary societies operated largely along the principles of gift economy and debt."
Hawai'ians had a number of skilled trades, and a caste system where a working class served a ruling class. Taxes were levied by the higher classes, and were paid in an amount based on the unit of land that was worked via subsistence farming. Those taxes were paid in the form of material goods (textiles, livestock, agriculture, etc). The material goods were the medium of exchange used to pay back a debt.
Therefore, Hawai'i did have money, in the form of commodity money (objects having intrinsic value in addition to value as a method of payment), which is distinct from barter in that there are specific recognizable units of exchange (specific amounts of commodity money used to pay a specific amount of debt). Material goods were also used as money for trade between islands.
When you say "taxes", I worry that your are imposing your view on the system.
Your [1] starts "The concept of private property was unknown to ancient Hawaiians" and says:
> Many Native Hawaiian scholars today make a distinction between
the annual exchange before and after written tax law. Ho‘okupu, the
term used for the exchange before written tax law, is similar to ‘auhau,
the term used after written tax law was instituted. Both refer to the
requirement to provide labor or a portion of an individual’s labor
production to a governmental agent, but as noted earlier, ho’okupu
literally means “to cause to grow.”
> Some Native Hawaiian scholars believe that ho‘o kupu and tax are
antithetical ideas, because, they argue, ho‘okupu was generated by
the person who gives, while taxes were demanded from the person
or group that receives.
Your [3] points out "Actually because the chief upon whose lands they lived owned all the land and resources in an ahupua'a, in a sense the tenants were only giving these resources to the rightful owner, in a useful form and upon demand, on a gift-tax basis."
If you own everything, how do you tax it?
If you own no private property, what does it mean to tax it?
The Roman Empire was basically modern. It had currency, banks, loans with interest, etc.
At the same time, the Slavic countries up north still were pre-monetary. There was little to no currency, but there was extensive trade in fur, salt, and other goods.
It depends on how you define money. Coins didn't really exist until the 7th century BC, that doesn't mean long-range widescale trade did not exist prior to that for 1000+ years but they didn't generally use money (in the way we would understand it at least) so the boundary between using money and barter wasn't really that clear.
This is highly dependent on the location. We certainly know there was a large interconnectede monetary economy around the middle east and the mediterranean around 3000 years ago.
The roman empire was largely a monetarian economy as well, about 2000 years prior to what is commonly referred to as "pre-industrial", they had quite an extensive banking system as well.
Good paper from the progenitor of the blockchain, Nick Szabo, positing that the first moneys emerged up to 75,000 years ago and possibly enabled Homo sapiens sapiens to supersede Neanderthals:
I seriously doubt that currency (a standardized medium of exchange) existed in prehistoric times. But barter economy certainly did, we have plenty of archeological evidence for it.
Still, even the barter economy was used for mostly "optional" activities. People were not dependent on it for survival, a tribe could live just fine on their own, without trade.
That's a pretty recent innovation, standardized coins didn't appear until the 600s BC, barely 100-150 years or so prior to the Greco-Persian wars. Widescale international trade existed for 1000+ years prior to that as far as we know, you don't necessarily standardized money for that.
In 600 BCE, Lydia's King Alyattes minted what is believed to be the first official currency, the Lydian stater. The coins were made from electrum, a mixture of silver and gold that occurs naturally, and the coins were stamped with pictures that acted as denominations.
Money and debt aren't exactly the same thing though right? The quipu is a system of IOUs iirc. More like the English debt stick. With currency/money (gold, silver, copper, fiat notes), we make a transaction on the spot and we're done. There is no debt in the simple case. The poster is saying they didn't use money and it sounds like they didn't. They used a system of tracking debts which could likely be traded.
I know it's all tightly related, but I believe there is a difference.
An accounting system using knots isn't money, per ser.
These systems of credit were based on mutual trust and social relations, often without a physical representation of money as we know it today.
Comparing this to coinage, the innovation of coins introduced a standardized physical object that could represent value, which allowed for a different kind of economic activity not solely based on personal trust and relationships. Coinage enabled transactions with strangers and facilitated trade over larger distances and among larger groups of people, where personal credit relationships were not feasible.
Money, has a specificity to it. In essence, while early credit systems were based on social relationships and trust within communities, coinage represented a more impersonal and widely accepted medium of exchange that did not necessarily rely on social bonds. This distinction is crucial because it allowed for the expansion of trade and the concept of money as an abstract unit of account, rather than a direct reflection of social debts and credits.
indeed, the comparison of quipu to modern digital money highlights the diversity of forms that 'money' can take. However, the fundamental difference lies in the functions and roles that these systems serve within their respective societies. The quipu was primarily an accounting tool, part of a complex system of record-keeping used by the Incas, which facilitated the administration of their economy, particularly in terms of tribute and state resources. It did not serve as a medium of exchange in the same way coins or modern digital money do.
modern money, whether digital or physical, serves several key functions: it is a medium of exchange, a unit of account, and a store of value. While the quipu certainly functioned as a unit of account, it's not clear that it served as a medium of exchange or a store of value. These are essential characteristics that define 'money' in the economic sense.
the impersonal nature of coinage and modern digital money allows them to facilitate trade and economic activity on a scale and with a degree of anonymity that's not possible with a system like quipu, which is deeply embedded in the social and political fabric of the society that uses it.
The transition to coinage and later to digittal transactions represents a move towards a more standardized, divisible, and portable form of money that can be used in a wide range of transactions, with or without a pre-existing relationship between the parties involved. This is quite different from the quipu, which was embedded in a specific cultural context and may not have been readily exchangeable or understood outside of that context.
So while it's tempting to draw parallels between ancient accounting systems and modern digital currencies, we must be careful not to conflate the two. Each serves its purpose within its particular economic and social milieu, with specific attributes and limitations that define its use as "money."
> It did not serve as a medium of exchange in the same way coins or modern digital money do.
Source for the confidence here? We know that a corvée economy existed, but I’m skeptical that we can rule out private quipo-based exchange. The evidence base is pretty thin; a lot of stuff didn’t survive Pizarro.
> Coinage enabled transactions with strangers and facilitated trade over larger distances and among larger groups of people, where personal credit relationships were not feasible.
Extensive trade international trade networks existed during the entire bronze age and the preceding periods without any coins, though. Coins are useful as an standardized accounting unit and are easy to transport but fundamentally are not that different from barter.
I think there is a lot of fantasy thinking that ancient times didn’t use money. Trade is evident from the earliest times as proven through goods at burial sites that originated thousands of miles away. Trade necessitated commoditized assets as intermediary value stores, and common ones included salt and furs in addition to hard metal coins and commoditized metal objects like swords.
Social relationships are still important the higher you go in finance - it’s much easier to get a $100 million loan for a new building with a strong relationship with a banker than as a stranger, regardless of collateral.
I think a pre-commercial time where people didn’t care about money is a fiction.
There's a lot of anthropological and archaeological evidence to the contrary. People indeed had trade and exchanges in ancient times, but these did not aalways necessitate a formalized system of money as we understand it today. The early forms of trade were often based on complex systems of credit and debt that were deeply intertwined with social relationships and trust within communities. David Graeber's work, "Debt: the first 5000 years," highlights that for more than 5,000 years before the invention of coins, humans extensively used such credit systems to buy and sell goods, long before the existence of coins or cash.
While it is true that trade is evident from ancient times, with goods found at burial sites that originated thousands of miles away, this does not automatically imply that all trade was facilitated by a commoditized asset serving as a universal medium of exchange. In many cases, goods like salt, furs, and metal objects were indeed used in trade, but they were part of a broader system of barter and reciprocal exchange, which could function effectively without a standardized form of money.
Regarding the role of social relationships in finance, while it's accurate that relationships remain crucial, especially for large transactions in modern times, this does not discount the fact that in the past, community trust and social bonds were often the primary means of securing credit, not collateral or commoditized money. This is evident in how competitive markets and the scarcity of trust can affect transactions, as Graeber notes through an anecdote where mutual aid within a community was a given, not a transaction requiring formal repayment.
The idea of a pre-commercial time where 'people didn't care about money' may indeed be fictional, but it's more nuanced than simply saying they used money in the way we do now. They cared about value and exchange, but these were frequently managed through social mechanisms rather than through impersonal, commoditized money. It's essential to understand that the concept of money has evolved and that early forms of trade and credit were valid economic systems in their own right, even if they don't match the monetary systems we are familiar with today.
My broader point is that certain people think that there is this utopian “pre money time” where capitalism didn’t exist. I believe capitalism is the default, free trade is the default, and the fundamental idea that people will engage in for-profit commerce is embedded into our psychologies.
capitalism, as a system defined by profit-driven markets and private ownership, is a relatively modern concept and not the default economic state throughout human history. earlier societies often operated on principles of reciprocity and communal sharing rather than for-profit trade. while the inclination to trade can be considered inherent, the forms and rules of trade have varied greatly across cultures and eras, shaped by differing social and political contexts.
Of course knots aren't "money" because money also needs scarcity and a way to prevent forgery but we have plenty of other examples: Rai stones, cowrie shells, other rare things ...
I think it’s highly likely that a system built for counting was used for counting loans, debts, and resources. The foundation of civilization is resource allocation.
I'm not an expert in this so maybe am just off base.
But the key difference (I have been told) is what you can do with that accounting.
Like, I can walk into a shop and buy anything on the wall with money, whereas that kind of accounting may have very different implications for what you can do with it.
Additionally, I can take money that I gathered from one source and use it somewhere else, and it's fungible in that I can use it anywhere else in the system. If I have a debt to one person in earlier systems that debt may be non-transferable.
If those two elements are true, it becomes very difficult to do a lot of the things that we think of as money, specifically interest and massive accumulation.
It would appear based on some simple googling that "money" has existed in many cultures going back 30,000 years, in two forms: "money of account" and "money of exchange". Of both of those they have taken various forms. Minted coins did not appear until around 3,000 years ago.