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1.) The first chapter of 'Money Dethroned - A Journey through Ashes', details many Chinese attempts at paper money. They all failed.
2.) These 'paper money' scams may be said to have been born under the Qin book burner and authoritarian Shih Huang Ti. The emperor slaughtered his innocent and rare white stag for the purpose of leather note money production.
3.) After the Tang dynasty mismanaged its economy by banning silk money while embracing paper, it soon enough was succeeded by many smaller states consolidating into the Song dynasty. Free market policies ushered an Industrial Revolution in the area, 700 years before Europe.
4.) That came to an end with inflationist Wang Anshi (still celebrated by the Chinese Communist Party). Wang embraced paper and severed redeemability, resulting in the first ever recorded hyperinflation. Jurchen steppe tribes could conquer most of the much more populous realm.
5.) By 1107, one type of Song note traded at 90% discount. When that one was replaced, the new one soon traded at a 90% discount as well. When war with the Jin in the north commenced, the paper currencies of both nations imploded.
6.) Weakened by systemic inflation, both the Jin and the Song fell to the Mongols, who took to money printing with fervor after converting the native notes to their own at 50:1.
7.) When the Ming threw off the Mongol yoke, they did it with the help of their own paper. On some Ming notes, death threats were inscribed to bring terror to anyone daring to value them less than the copper coins they nominally represented.
8.) These Ming notes hyperinflated as well. By 1400, depreciation stood at 97%. Soon enough it stood at 99.7%. So much for the supposed superiority of the State's death threat notes.
Between 1500 and 1800, the Chinese seems mostly to have kept away from paper money.
Between 1500 and 1800, the Chinese seems mostly to have kept away from paper money.
9.) When the Taiping Rebellion broke out in the 1850's, the Chinese State deemed it necessary to vigorously take to paper again. It waged Total War against the theocratic Heavenly Kingdom's Hong Xiuquan, a self-proclaimed younger brother of Jesus Christ.
10.) After a death toll in the millions, and after putting an end to the Heavenly Kingdom's anti-demon policies of burning women alive, the paper money fell in disuse.
Paper money inflation would soon return to China; it's a cycle which never ends.
Paper money inflation would soon return to China; it's a cycle which never ends.
