I often think about the fact that the objects we use to represent currency have no actual practical utility outside of their representation of “money”. But why did we begin using this system in place of exchanging good and services with one another? At what point did humans see fit that rounded metals and rectangular sheets of paper had an assigned representation of value that could be exchanged for goods and services?
In: Economics
The book “Debt: The First 5,000 Years”, an in-depth look at history of debt, bartering, and the use of currency, notes that things like coins and such became useful for outsiders not a part of a community’s internal systems of debt. If we’re in the same community I know where you live as does everyone else and you’re not really gonna go anywhere because your life is HERE and we all exchange goods and services in our own way; no need for coins that have no intrinsic value. But those passing through and not part of that insider system, coins were a sort of widespread standard “currency” and a way to assign value to things that more or less everyone in a larger region understood.
I promise, the literature explains it better 😀
Latest Answers