Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 69, No. 423, January 1851Various
History
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 69, No. 423, January 1851
Various
England -- Periodicals; Scotland -- Periodicals
produced by the augmentation of the amount of the circulating medium of
mankind, it must facilitate the acquisition of it for the purposes of
commerce, or for sustaining the undertakings of industry.
But though this is the first, it is by no means either the only or the
most important effect of a great addition to the gold treasures of
the earth. By far the most important and beneficial effect is to be
found in _the gradual but certain rise of prices_, whether measured in
gold, silver, or paper, which inevitably results from any considerable
addition to the circulating medium of mankind. This effect is precisely
analogous to the great rise of prices which took place during the
war, in consequence of the extended issue of paper which was made
after 1797 to sustain its expenses. It is well known that it more than
doubled the cost of every article of consumption: it raised the price
of wheat, in fifteen years, from 55s. to 110s.[5] This effect resulted
from the extension of the issues of the Bank of England from twelve to
twenty-eight millions a-year. A result precisely the same must take
place over the whole world from a lasting and considerable addition to
the metallic treasures by which its exchanges are conducted. If the
gold in circulation, or which may be put into circulation, is greatly
augmented, the price of everything must rise, whether it is paid in
_gold or silver_, just as the price of everything rose during the war,
whether paid in specie or in paper. Gold then bore such a monopoly
price, from its being so much in request for the necessities of war,
that the guinea at last came to be worth twenty-eight shillings. That
was the enhanced price of gold, as compared with silver; it had risen
thirty per cent in consequence of the absorption of gold specie in the
Peninsular, German, and Russian campaigns. But the change of prices
resulting from the extended issue of paper was much more considerable;
it had increased not thirty, but a hundred per cent, and that equally,
whether the price was paid in gold, silver, paper, or copper.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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