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by erikb
4061 days ago
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Is it true that governments started to make money to be money? I thought banks started doing that first. In my eyes it doesn't make sense for governments to start doing that. Classical governments didn't achieve things because they had money, but because they had power and people believed in that power. A painter would come and change the kings walls colour not because he gets paid well, but because he loses his head if he doesn't. Banks (or banking families might be better) on the other hand trade debt. As anybody who gets value from trade they want to decrease the burden of trading debt, so instead of some infeasible hard, heavy stuff like gold barrels they invent coins, and because that's also quite heavy and hard to track they invent paper money. Paper is fairly easy to transport, exchange, so banks are happy. Then the governments come and try to control money, because their job/desire is to control what people are doing. |
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IIRC it was governments, for taxation. They have more motive than a banker does. A banker is a professional trader, in the business of buying and selling things at appropriate prices - that's where they make their profit, so having their clients pay them in non-money is an advantage. By contrast for a government that's collecting 5% of people's income, having that in a wide variety of trade goods is an inconvenience.