Chapter 1762 Economics

Wars require money, and the ancients were not stupid, but they were very good at it.

Wars require money, and the currency in ancient times was basically precious metals. Coins made of precious metals can also be counterfeited or short-changed.

As long as there are people, there will be economic activities. The poor barter; the nobles and merchants circulate a large amount of currency and use money to trade.

Gold, silver, brass, and even iron can be used as currency.

The so-called golden age, silver age, brass age, and black iron age are all changes in currency.

However, it would be too stupid to use iron as currency, because iron has a high output and is easy to cast. It is easy for the people to counterfeit a large number of them, and the currency market will be in chaos.

Brass is generally used as a low-level currency and is widely circulated. Although it is not a precious metal, it is also a generally recognized small money.

Finally, there is gold and silver, which are the real big money.

The king often has no spare money, but wants to fight a war and wants to be extravagant. What should he do? The first way is to borrow money from big merchants or big landlords.

In feudal society, the retainers of the nobles would only be loyal to the nobles, not to the king. The lord had ownership of everything in the fiefdom, so everything produced on the fiefdom belonged to the lord, not to the king.

Some lords were lucky and opened gold mines, so the lords would be richer than the king.

Some lords had fertile land and produced all kinds of food and livestock, so they could be richer than the king as long as they managed it.

The king could only guard his own land and collect taxes. If they dared to reach out to the nobles, he would be in trouble.

If the king had no money, he could borrow money from the rich lords. When repaying the money, of course, interest would be added. What if he couldn't repay it?

Then go to war, the king raised his arms and robbed a sum of money from other countries and returned it to the lord.

However, if the king was a little cunning, he would tamper with the currency. For example, if he had no money and borrowed 1,000 gold coins, he melted the gold coins and added some other cheap metals, so he might get 1,200 gold or even 1,500 gold.

This is the king making counterfeit coins, but it is a poison to quench thirst.

After these inferior coins are put on the market, they will definitely cause resistance from the people. Maybe there will be no impact in the short term, but since the king has publicly made counterfeit coins, it will definitely cause many civil forces to follow suit.

When people use money, they must find ways to use the counterfeit coins that are short of weight first and collect the gold coins with sufficient weight.

Over time, there will be more inferior coins than good coins on the market, which is the so-called inferior coins driving out good coins.

More and more inferior coins will lead to rising prices. Because everyone knows that now a gold coin can only be used as two-thirds, or half a coin. The goods that originally cost 1 gold coin will soon be sold for 2 coins.

When prices rise, the money will be even less valuable, and we have to find ways to make more money.

If the king is more cunning, he will manipulate the exchange rate next. For example, today the currency with neighboring countries is 1:1, and the king uses 1,000 of his own currency to exchange for 1,000 foreign currencies.

The next day, the king began to devalue his own domestic currency, changing the exchange rate to 2:1, and then exchanged the 1,000 foreign gold coins he exchanged yesterday for 2,000 domestic gold coins.

In this way, the king had 1,000 more gold coins out of thin air, and could buy goods worth 1,000 more gold coins, but this method could not last long, because the extra 1,000 out of thin air was actually a disguised exploitation of the people of his country. Moreover, although the king had the power to do so, changing the exchange rate in this way would definitely affect international transactions. It was very unfriendly to foreign capital, because the money they earned suddenly shrank. Over time, no one was willing to do business with foreign countries.

Of course, the king's third way was to abolish the old currency and issue a new one.

Isn't there no money? Then abolish the money of the people and re-establish the currency yourself. In ancient times, because the currency was made of precious metals, it had value in itself. The king issued a new currency because he had no gold, so the new currency would definitely not be precious metals, but generally iron money.

However, the disadvantages of iron money have been mentioned above. Although it can help the king solve the funding problem, the disadvantages of iron money are more terrible than bad money, and the inflation caused is even more severe.

In short, if the king has no money, he will find ways to solve the problem of having no money, whether it is honestly borrowing money or cunningly disrupting the currency market, there is always a way.

Generally, the king is more honest. If he has no money, he will borrow money and then go out to rob. Because this method is the most effective, if he uses bad money, it may cause greater unrest.

And the creditors also prefer the first method. They will even charge forward because the king wants to go to war and borrow more money to invest in the king.

Anyway, as long as they complete the robbery, the money they invested can be recovered, and they can also make a lot of money.

The king and the big households are really powerful. After the robbery is completed, the big households' money is returned in full, and the profits of the robbery are divided into 30% and 70%.

Only when the king's credit is completely bankrupt and he can't borrow money at all, the king will take the risk of using bad money. Of course, at this time, the king usually owes a lot of debts, so he has to use cunning methods to find money to spend.

However, because ancient money is different from modern paper money, precious metals have their own value, so inflation in ancient times must be followed by deflation. Because the value of precious metals is still there, people will accumulate precious metals, just like food, just in case.

If you don't spend money, the precious metals in circulation will become less and less, which will naturally cause deflation. If there were 1,000 gold coins in circulation, only 200 gold coins would be in circulation after the deflation, but there are still so many goods. If merchants want to sell, they can only sell 1,000 gold coins for 200 gold coins.

These 200 gold coins may not even cover the cost, so merchants can only dismiss employees and close their businesses. A large number of people and businesses, everyone is even more afraid to spend money, so all industries are depressed, and finally the king has no money and can only go bankrupt, and the country is finished.

Inflation will make people miserable, and so will deflation.

And the best way to solve economic problems is actually to consume population.

So the kingdom and the empire fight every day, but both sides develop stably, because they consume a certain population and reduce expenditures. You know, many city residents don't pay much tax, but they eat and use a lot every year, which consumes a lot of public power. So after consuming the population, it is equivalent to saving money.

The Undead King obviously doesn't understand the economy of the other world, so he is thinking hard about making money. And Duran knows these economic activities very well, so he has come to the headquarters of a certain chamber of commerce. He has only one goal: to borrow money. Then hire a mercenary, take the lead in starting a war, and then he will complete the Undead King's evil plan.

He wants to start a war, and then let the Saint Seiya end the war and become the savior.