[networkadmin]

The whole nation is eaten up by gambling and other vices at this time. It's not the first time such a thing has happened in a nation's history. Generally it occurs just after widespread monetary debasement and just before major, world shaking disasters. (You Are Here.)

Reference: Andrew Dickson White (first president of Cornell) "Fiat Money Inflation In France", published 1896:

"The government now began, and continued by spasms to grind out still more paper; commerce was at first stimulated by the difference in exchange; but this cause soon ceased to operate, and commerce, having been stimulated unhealthfully, wasted away.

Manufactures at first received a great impulse; but, ere long, this overproduction and overstimulus proved as fatal to them as to commerce. From time to time there was a revival of hope caused by an apparent revival of business; but this revival of business was at last seen to be caused more and more by the desire of far-seeing and cunning men of affairs to exchange paper money for objects of permanent value. As to the people at large, the classes living on fixed incomes and small salaries felt the pressure first, as soon as the purchasing power of their fixed incomes was reduced. Soon the great class living on wages felt it even more sadly.

Prices of the necessities of life increased: merchants were obliged to increase them, not only to cover depreciation of their merchandise, but also to cover their risk of loss from fluctuation; and, while the prices of products thus rose, wages, which had at first gone up under the general stimulus, lagged behind. Under the universal doubt and discouragement, commerce and manufactures were checked or destroyed. As a consequence the demand for labor was diminished; laboring men were thrown out of employment, and, under the operation of the simplest law of supply and demand, the price of labor--the daily wages of the laboring class--went down until, at a time when prices of food, clothing and various articles of consumption were enormous, wages were nearly as low as at the time preceding the first issue of irredeemable currency."

[elphinstone]

He's writing about Revolutionary France's debasement, but Mackay's Extraordinary Delusions documents France's debasement under John Law about 70 years earlier, which shows how easily such mistakes are repeated.

[networkadmin]

"The mercantile classes at first thought themselves exempt from the general misfortune. They were delighted at the apparent advance in the value of the goods upon their shelves. But they soon found that, as they increased prices to cover the inflation of currency and the risk from fluctuation and uncertainty, purchases became less in amount and payments less sure; a feeling of insecurity spread throughout the country; enterprise was deadened and stagnation followed.

New issues of paper were then clamored for as more drams are demanded by a drunkard. New issues only increased the evil; capitalists were all the more reluctant to embark their money on such a sea of doubt. Workmen of all sorts were more and more thrown out of employment. Issue after issue of currency came; but no relief resulted save a momentary stimulus, which aggravated the disease. The most ingenious evasions of natural laws in finance which the most subtle theorists could contrive were tried--all in vain; the most brilliant substitutes for those laws were tried; "self-regulating" schemes, "interconverting" schemes--all equally vain. All thoughtful men had lost confidence. All men were waiting; stagnation became worse and worse. At last came the collapse and then a return, by a fearful shock, to a state of things which presented something like certainty of remuneration to capital and labor. Then, and not till then, came the beginning of a new era of prosperity.

Just as dependent on the law of cause and effect was the moral development. Out of the inflation of prices grew a speculating class; and, in the complete uncertainty as to the future, all business became a game of chance, and all business men, gamblers. In city centers came a quick growth of stock-jobbers and speculators; and these set a debasing fashion in business which spread to the remotest parts of the country. Instead of satisfaction with legitimate profits, came a passion for inordinate gains. Then, too, as values became more and more uncertain, there was no longer any motive for care or economy, but every motive for immediate expenditure and present enjoyment. So came upon the nation the obliteration of thrift."

[dang]

Please don't make posts consisting of quotes and nothing else. HN is a supposed to be a site for curious conversation. It's not hard to see how posts like this interrupt that and bog it down - imagine someone at a dinner party* reading entire paragraphs like this out loud.

(* I don't know why I said "dinner party", since I don't go to those, the conversation usually isn't good, and they aren't my idea of fun, but oh well, it makes the point)

[bahmboo]

It definitely bogs things down. I would have preferred even an AI summary of the text, granted that it was accompanied by additional commentary to tie that to the subject at hand, rather than dumping in text with the assumption that the reader will understand the implicit connection.

[networkadmin]

Since you have now shadowbanned my comments from the site, I'm guessing you won't read this, so it's probably safe to point out that you are a useless, whiny fag who desperately needs to get out of his mom's basement and get a life.

[dang]

I don't know if this will help or not, but I didn't shadowban you. (I wouldn't post a moderation reply and at the same time ban the account without saying so; that would be incongruent.)

What happened is that, independently of my reply, HN's software started killing your posts because your account had crossed some thresholds at which the software starts doing that.

Like I said, it may be a distinction without a difference to you, but that's what happened.

[aisenik]

I don't really understand your point. We should reject ideas that make us feel like we have to sit through a monologue at a dinner party?

[dang]

We should find more interesting ways to communicate ideas than lengthy recitation.

[networkadmin]

"In this mania for yielding to present enjoyment rather than providing for future comfort were the seeds of new growths of wretchedness: luxury, senseless and extravagant, set in: this, too, spread as a fashion. To feed it, there came cheatery in the nation at large and corruption among officials and persons holding trusts. While men set such fashions in private and official business, women set fashions of extravagance in dress and living that added to the incentives to corruption. Faith in moral considerations, or even in good impulses, yielded to general distrust. National honor was thought a fiction cherished only by hypocrites. Patriotism was eaten out by cynicism.

Thus was the history of France logically developed in obedience to natural laws; such has, to a greater or less degree, always been the result of irredeemable paper, created according to the whim or interest of legislative assemblies rather than based upon standards of value permanent in their nature and agreed upon throughout the entire world. Such, we may fairly expect, will always be the result of them until the ñat of the Almighty shall evolve laws in the universe radically different from those which at present obtain.

And, finally, as to the general development of the theory and practice which all this history records: my subject has been Fiat Money in France; How it came; What it brought; and How it ended.

It came by seeking a remedy for a comparatively small evil in an evil infinitely more dangerous. To cure a disease temporary in its character, a corrosive poison was administered, which ate out the vitals of French prosperity.

It progressed according to a law in social physics which we may call the "law of accelerating issue and depreciation." It was comparatively easy to refrain from the first issue; it was exceedingly difficult to refrain from the second; to refrain from the third and those following was practically impossible.

It brought, as we have seen, commerce and manufactures, the mercantile interest, the agricultural interest, to ruin. It brought on these the same destruction which would come to a Hollander opening the dykes of the sea to irrigate his garden in a dry summer. It ended in the complete financial, moral and political prostration of France--a prostration from which only a Napoleon could raise it."

[microtonal]

What's the point of posting entire book fragments here?

[networkadmin]

So that lazy people who form their worldview via a Quick Google Search, Wikipedia articles, and/or "news media" can actually have a chance to learn something real about the time they are living in.

It's like a dozen paragraphs, forming one complete argument. Is this too much material to take in all at once, in this brave new TLDR tomorrow?

[gilleain]

Neat in theory, but in practice ineffective. Those who might read multiple large exerpts from a book would actually seek out the source.

Do as you wish, however I doubt this will have the effect you want here.

[wgjordan]

> It's like a dozen paragraphs, forming one complete argument. Is this too much material to take in all at once, in this brave new TLDR tomorrow?

The issue is not that you cited a dozen-paragraph argument, it's that you inlined all the text directly into a series of comments instead of a link to the text on a separate page. It visually overwhelms the discussion thread and is disruptive to the broader discussion, which is not strictly against guidelines but generally seen as non-normative behavior.

[pgruenbacher]

i enjoyed reading it thank you

[kelnos]

I don't come here to read lengthy quotes from random authors. I come here for discussion and interesting viewpoints from our community. Posting a lengthy quote is low-effort; more valuable would be to write up your take on it in your own words, and, if you want, link to the original source material that you would have otherwise quoted.