Paper Money

     Richard Doty. Paper Money (1977) An overview of paper currency available to numismatists. Doty promotes the hobby with numerous colour photos, and a brief survey of paper currency by country and region. I learned a few new facts, such as the issue of Notgeld (emergency money) by German towns and villages when hyper-inflation prevented the national bank from supplying cash. The Chinese were the first to use paper money about 1400 years ago, but they soon gave up on it because it was too easy to counterfeit, and because the temptation to print too much was too great. They did not use paper money again until the 1800s.
     The West invented paper money independently, when bankers and merchants issued letters of credit. Since the issuers were good for the coin specified on these instruments, people quickly realised that letters were tradable, and began to use them make payments. The next step was to use paper bills as means of exchange, at first always with the promise to redeem them for real money, i.e. metal coin. Eventually, paper bills were defined as legal tender. The history of paper money is thus the history of the slow recognition that money is information about wealth and not itself wealth. Nowadays, most money circulates as debit and credit entries in bank accounts. Canada and a few other countries now use plastic instead of paper for bills, testifying that cash will likely not disappear in the near term. But the steady development of money from precious materials to pure information is nearly complete.
     An interesting little book. Numismatics, like most collector hobbies, has declined, which makes this book an historical document. **½