As a comment to the previous post by Ian Schindler on the “Financial Singularity” I am reposting an earlier post (slightly edited) on a similar subject that appeared on the old version of the “Seneca Effect.” During the Covid epidemic, people found themselves locked inside their homes, unable to use the money they had.
The owners of those buried Roman hoards that occasionally turn up were probably overtaken by sudden, unexpected “life reversals” that prevented them going back for their stashes. Buried items are not locked up, hence they are only safe if NO ONE knows about them. Unfortunately, if an owner suffers an unexpected demise, he takes the secret location of his stash with him to the grave.
The fact that money is useless if there is nothing to buy eludes people even today. The belief in the law of “supply and demand” is so strong that most people think a sufficiently large sum of money can coax anything one wants out of hiding, or motivate an aspiring seller into producing it. Sometimes that is just not possible.
A good example can be found in Europe today. The EU wanted to buy artillery shells for Ukraine at $2K per round. They appropriated money for the purpose, but the necessary production capacity just doesn’t exist in the West, so all that was accomplished was that the existing shells rose in price to $8K per round.
Back in high school, our Russian professor used to tell us about his annual trips to visit relatives in the old Soviet Union in the 1960s. Back then during the Cold War, it was always described to us as a poverty-stricken place. But as he explained, the reality was that people had adequate money. There just wasn’t very much in the way of consumer goods for people to buy, because most of the factories were devoted to making other things. Whenever a few scarce consumer goods became available at the local store, people would line up for hours outside, hoping to get a chance to buy one of those few items. Most came away empty-handed, despite having the money.
A final thought: it is said that gold is not the basis for our monetary system, and in the sense that none of the world’s currencies are gold-backed, this is true. But then why are central banks all over the world still so anxious to own it?
Very interesting article, Ugo, with significant parallels with our current civilization. I think your view on the Middle Ages is not quite accurate, though.
Following the Roman Empire (after the Roman Republic), and its final demise, the Middle Ages extended over a thousand years in Europe. More time elapsed during the Middle Ages than since the Middle Ages ended, in 1453 according to most scholars or1492 as the latest date.
The concentration of power and relative wealth (wealth inequality) was never, ever diminished during this millenium. More than relics (I don't deny that relics were a major currency), land ownership was the real marker of wealth, power and prestige during the Middle Ages, and the source of energy were animal and (often forced) human labor. During the Middle Ages, the economic system changed several times, stabilizing around the feudal system, which also describes how the whole medieval society functioned from the 9th to the 15th century, or between the 10th and the 15th century (if we consider that the central state of the Carolingian Empire doesn't qualify even with other qualifiers of feudalism), or between the 10th and the early 18th century if we include a long transition period between feudalism and capitalism. This is a matter of definition. But in any case, in a much poorer economic environment, with less technology, less sophistication and less population, the Middle Ages and within, the feudal society, operated with even more extreme inequality than the Roman Empire. Inequality was actually the visible framework and outspoken ideology and justification of feudalism, without the (partial) pretense of the later capitalistic system. We are now transitioning back to a feudal system; it is not immediate as was not immediate its demises, but we can see the signs everywhere. Adam Flint, author of the prospective fiction, "Mona."
I was initiating a comment, but I suppose that answering you is almost the same!
During Middle Ages power and richness was based on Serfdom (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serfdom) so basically on ownership of PEOPLE, usually the limiting factor was viability of manpower not land or resources, technology was also quite improved during the period: wind power and water wheels were improved, but the mayor update was the horse collar during the late Ages (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horse_collar). If we observe carefully, we see that we have a great deal of building of monumental buildings as churches, cathedrals, monasteries and other sacred places but also civilian with the explosion of communes and military with the diffusion of castles, expensive and quite complex works that presuppose a flourishing economy.
The Professor Bardi is quite right, pointing at relics and their role as motive force of Middle Ages economy, but I suppose he undervalues some fine details of that aspect, peregrines were exempted from servitude and taxes and had free passage trough different political borders and the "lord" couldn't be quite sure if a peregrine will come back..... Nobles had a really practical obligations to their people because the number and skill of their serfs was their main wealth, so it was relatively easy to lose it (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noblesse_oblige): peregrinates, a trip for "commerce" or other justifiable excuse or simply the impossibility of control of border offered ample opportunity for a change of residence and servitude and probably a new lord willing to "welcome" a new serf (literally a coin willingly jumping in his bag)!
In other Blogs I said that today we are more similar to the 1220AC, the time of St. Francis of Assisi, was a time of relative prosperity (in Italy) with a big deal of free communes competing in splendor and showing wealth was the norm but also a time of extreme inequalities, we also have the teachings of St. Antony of Padua and the Dulcinians (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dulcinians)....
Hello, Adam. Thanks for your detailed comment. Indeed, we can make parallels with the Middle Ages, but I never said in my post that inequality was not so bad as in Roman times. As you correctly said, (and Athanasius, too), the Middle Ages were a period of tremendous inequality. What I think, though, is that inequality was tempered, at least in part, by an attitude that valued human life that didn't exist in Roman times. For instance, the Roman legislation gave complete power of life and death to slave owners on their slaves. That was not possible during Middle Ages, and theoretically slavery was forbidden -- even though it took the form of serfdom and there was this curious quirk that "Infidels" (that is muslims) could be taken as slaves. But the question of inequality was felt during the Middle Ages and Athanasius is right in citing St. Francis of Assisi. A figure like him would have been unthinkable in the Middle Ages, just as it is unthinkable in our times. But there are many facets and many quirks in all historical periods. A long story....
Athanasius and Ugo. Thank you for your comments. This inexhaustible subject must somewhat fit in a restrained format.
Writing about the Middle Ages, spanning over a thousand years, in a short text can't render the complexity of geography, technical evolutions, (that were real as Athanasius points out,) the changing fabric of society. But first, slavery.
Slavery never disappeared from medieval Europe. While slavery declined in northwestern Europe, being replaced by serfdom by the middle of the Middle Ages with the feudal system (9-10th century), it persisted largely in Sicily, southern Italy, Russia, southern France, Spain, and North Africa. Most of these slaves were "white," coming from areas in Eastern Europe or near the Black Sea. Slavery in the Early Middle Ages (500–1000) was a continuation of earlier Roman practices from late antiquity. With the continuation of Roman legal practices of slavery, new laws and practices concerning slavery spread throughout Europe.
Slavery locally may have receded, sometimes with the intervention of the Church regarding Christian slaves, or for instance with the rise of Bathilde (626–680), queen of the Franks, outlawing slave-trading of Christians throughout the Merovingian empire. Yet, about ten percent of England’s population entered in the Domesday Book (1086) were slaves. despite chattel slavery of English Christians being nominally discontinued after the 1066 Normand conquest. It is difficult to be certain about slave numbers, however, since the old Roman word for slave (servus) continued to be applied to unfree people whose status later was reflected by the term serf.
After the Middle Ages: there is a general theoretical distinction between captives from the Ottoman Empire and its satellite states, defined as temporary slaves, and slaves from the Atlantic or sub-Saharan Africa, even if they sometimes lived the same experience in Europe. Ransom demands and payments were a significant form of commerce in the Mediterranean basin until the middle of the 19th century and slavery persisted in Europe throughout the 1800s.
Ugo, when you write "The Roman legislation gave complete power of life and death to slave owners on their slaves. That was not possible during Middle Ages." You are only talking about the feudal time in Europe in your second sentence, not the first half but after the middle of this very long period.
Anastasius writes about serfdom, "so basically on ownership of PEOPLE, usually the limiting factor was viability of manpower not land or resources." I think we need to give a nuance of perspective here. Serfdom like slavery was basically the ownership of people, though not with absolute rights for the owner with serfdom. But one might observe that every type of slavery, or similar system like serfdom in the feudal Middle Ages, was different according to time and geography. Slavery in Mesopotamia, in the Bible, in Greece, Rome, China, India, Africa, Islam, Pre-Columbian America, during the transatlantic slave trade depending on each country etc., was always different and codified in different ways. Regarding serfdom, the "limiting factor" [of not killing them or selling them], in my opinion, beyond the codification, was indeed viability just as for slaves, because slaves and serfs had value and were the indispensable and sole work power with animals. You don't kill your capital unless you have to, but this may go, (and indeed went) with a lot of abuse with no or very little recourse of the law.
And when you write "not land," I beg to disagree. All the time in human history since the invention of agriculture, land was the major marker of wealth and power, of course along with manpower ownership. This was more or less absolute (less absolute during the Roman Empire for instance regarding land when wealth and prestige had other avenues), but land ownership was the absolute cornerstone of the medieval society with, of course, the means to exploit it: humans (with serfdom and rents) and animals, woven in a complex web of loyalties, military obligations, levels of land ownership and transmissions through lineage and marriage within the diverse lord class of nobility. The system started to change with the development of commerce and free cities in the late Middle Ages, with the trauma of the black plague and the Hundred Year War, leading to a slow erosion of the system and a long transition to capitalism.
Regarding the techniques, the end of antiquity was a massive loss of knowledge, comfort, commerce,, intellectual life in every possible domain. Very little can compare in the Middle Ages as a whole, with the sophistication of Greece or the Roman Empire. Yet it is true that during the feudal system of the Middle Ages, new technologies were introduced, in a large part because of the decline of classical slavery.
The water mill technique appeared at the earliest in the 11th century in Europe. These mills were known in the Middle East (first traces in antique Egypt). With slavery, the Romans and the previous lords of the Middle Ages didn't have a need for it.
The very first wind mill appeared later in Europe, during the very late 12th century, and had existed for centuries earlier in Iran, Afghanistan and today's Pakistan.
The first horse collar appeared in Europe during the 10th century, and became widespread during the feudal period.
Architecture techniques were almost completely lost after the fall of the Roman empire (officially 476 AD) and cities were abandoned. The building of romanesque style churches from the middle of the 11th century can be considered a first modest architectural "renaissance." This was soon followed by the building of the first stone castles after the Normand conquest of England (1066), followed by the castle "boom" of the 12th and 13th centuries, as were stone city walls erected with the rebirth of cities. Finally, the gothic style techniques revolutionized the construction of clerical buildings from the early 12th century, first with the Abbey of St. Denis and the Cathedral of Sens (in France), then spread through Europe like a wildfire.
Regarding serfdom, it was the rule for a long time in the feudal society, but there were also peregrines (as Anasthasius points out) and even free peasants with servants (the word "servant" itself bearing its origin of "servitude"), and a fledging bourgeoisie. History was constantly evolving during the European Middle Ages. This also happened after capitalism was firmly established; there were many, evolving types of capitalism, which is still evolving.
no fossil fuels no mining no renewable energy systems to build no money we can not buy an electric car no money we can not pay for our electricty or heat pump our or drinking water nor pay our house rent so is it stil worth living then ????
Some people certainly bought and sold a lot of stuff during (and immediately after) the pandemic... just in the USA, Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg and Warren Buffet increased their collective wealth by over a trillion dollars, IIRC.
But not the vast majority of us. Conspicuous consumption is not for the proles ...
The owners of those buried Roman hoards that occasionally turn up were probably overtaken by sudden, unexpected “life reversals” that prevented them going back for their stashes. Buried items are not locked up, hence they are only safe if NO ONE knows about them. Unfortunately, if an owner suffers an unexpected demise, he takes the secret location of his stash with him to the grave.
The fact that money is useless if there is nothing to buy eludes people even today. The belief in the law of “supply and demand” is so strong that most people think a sufficiently large sum of money can coax anything one wants out of hiding, or motivate an aspiring seller into producing it. Sometimes that is just not possible.
A good example can be found in Europe today. The EU wanted to buy artillery shells for Ukraine at $2K per round. They appropriated money for the purpose, but the necessary production capacity just doesn’t exist in the West, so all that was accomplished was that the existing shells rose in price to $8K per round.
Back in high school, our Russian professor used to tell us about his annual trips to visit relatives in the old Soviet Union in the 1960s. Back then during the Cold War, it was always described to us as a poverty-stricken place. But as he explained, the reality was that people had adequate money. There just wasn’t very much in the way of consumer goods for people to buy, because most of the factories were devoted to making other things. Whenever a few scarce consumer goods became available at the local store, people would line up for hours outside, hoping to get a chance to buy one of those few items. Most came away empty-handed, despite having the money.
A final thought: it is said that gold is not the basis for our monetary system, and in the sense that none of the world’s currencies are gold-backed, this is true. But then why are central banks all over the world still so anxious to own it?
Very interesting article, Ugo, with significant parallels with our current civilization. I think your view on the Middle Ages is not quite accurate, though.
Following the Roman Empire (after the Roman Republic), and its final demise, the Middle Ages extended over a thousand years in Europe. More time elapsed during the Middle Ages than since the Middle Ages ended, in 1453 according to most scholars or1492 as the latest date.
The concentration of power and relative wealth (wealth inequality) was never, ever diminished during this millenium. More than relics (I don't deny that relics were a major currency), land ownership was the real marker of wealth, power and prestige during the Middle Ages, and the source of energy were animal and (often forced) human labor. During the Middle Ages, the economic system changed several times, stabilizing around the feudal system, which also describes how the whole medieval society functioned from the 9th to the 15th century, or between the 10th and the 15th century (if we consider that the central state of the Carolingian Empire doesn't qualify even with other qualifiers of feudalism), or between the 10th and the early 18th century if we include a long transition period between feudalism and capitalism. This is a matter of definition. But in any case, in a much poorer economic environment, with less technology, less sophistication and less population, the Middle Ages and within, the feudal society, operated with even more extreme inequality than the Roman Empire. Inequality was actually the visible framework and outspoken ideology and justification of feudalism, without the (partial) pretense of the later capitalistic system. We are now transitioning back to a feudal system; it is not immediate as was not immediate its demises, but we can see the signs everywhere. Adam Flint, author of the prospective fiction, "Mona."
I was initiating a comment, but I suppose that answering you is almost the same!
During Middle Ages power and richness was based on Serfdom (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serfdom) so basically on ownership of PEOPLE, usually the limiting factor was viability of manpower not land or resources, technology was also quite improved during the period: wind power and water wheels were improved, but the mayor update was the horse collar during the late Ages (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horse_collar). If we observe carefully, we see that we have a great deal of building of monumental buildings as churches, cathedrals, monasteries and other sacred places but also civilian with the explosion of communes and military with the diffusion of castles, expensive and quite complex works that presuppose a flourishing economy.
The Professor Bardi is quite right, pointing at relics and their role as motive force of Middle Ages economy, but I suppose he undervalues some fine details of that aspect, peregrines were exempted from servitude and taxes and had free passage trough different political borders and the "lord" couldn't be quite sure if a peregrine will come back..... Nobles had a really practical obligations to their people because the number and skill of their serfs was their main wealth, so it was relatively easy to lose it (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noblesse_oblige): peregrinates, a trip for "commerce" or other justifiable excuse or simply the impossibility of control of border offered ample opportunity for a change of residence and servitude and probably a new lord willing to "welcome" a new serf (literally a coin willingly jumping in his bag)!
In other Blogs I said that today we are more similar to the 1220AC, the time of St. Francis of Assisi, was a time of relative prosperity (in Italy) with a big deal of free communes competing in splendor and showing wealth was the norm but also a time of extreme inequalities, we also have the teachings of St. Antony of Padua and the Dulcinians (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dulcinians)....
Hello, Adam. Thanks for your detailed comment. Indeed, we can make parallels with the Middle Ages, but I never said in my post that inequality was not so bad as in Roman times. As you correctly said, (and Athanasius, too), the Middle Ages were a period of tremendous inequality. What I think, though, is that inequality was tempered, at least in part, by an attitude that valued human life that didn't exist in Roman times. For instance, the Roman legislation gave complete power of life and death to slave owners on their slaves. That was not possible during Middle Ages, and theoretically slavery was forbidden -- even though it took the form of serfdom and there was this curious quirk that "Infidels" (that is muslims) could be taken as slaves. But the question of inequality was felt during the Middle Ages and Athanasius is right in citing St. Francis of Assisi. A figure like him would have been unthinkable in the Middle Ages, just as it is unthinkable in our times. But there are many facets and many quirks in all historical periods. A long story....
Athanasius and Ugo. Thank you for your comments. This inexhaustible subject must somewhat fit in a restrained format.
Writing about the Middle Ages, spanning over a thousand years, in a short text can't render the complexity of geography, technical evolutions, (that were real as Athanasius points out,) the changing fabric of society. But first, slavery.
Slavery never disappeared from medieval Europe. While slavery declined in northwestern Europe, being replaced by serfdom by the middle of the Middle Ages with the feudal system (9-10th century), it persisted largely in Sicily, southern Italy, Russia, southern France, Spain, and North Africa. Most of these slaves were "white," coming from areas in Eastern Europe or near the Black Sea. Slavery in the Early Middle Ages (500–1000) was a continuation of earlier Roman practices from late antiquity. With the continuation of Roman legal practices of slavery, new laws and practices concerning slavery spread throughout Europe.
Slavery locally may have receded, sometimes with the intervention of the Church regarding Christian slaves, or for instance with the rise of Bathilde (626–680), queen of the Franks, outlawing slave-trading of Christians throughout the Merovingian empire. Yet, about ten percent of England’s population entered in the Domesday Book (1086) were slaves. despite chattel slavery of English Christians being nominally discontinued after the 1066 Normand conquest. It is difficult to be certain about slave numbers, however, since the old Roman word for slave (servus) continued to be applied to unfree people whose status later was reflected by the term serf.
After the Middle Ages: there is a general theoretical distinction between captives from the Ottoman Empire and its satellite states, defined as temporary slaves, and slaves from the Atlantic or sub-Saharan Africa, even if they sometimes lived the same experience in Europe. Ransom demands and payments were a significant form of commerce in the Mediterranean basin until the middle of the 19th century and slavery persisted in Europe throughout the 1800s.
Ugo, when you write "The Roman legislation gave complete power of life and death to slave owners on their slaves. That was not possible during Middle Ages." You are only talking about the feudal time in Europe in your second sentence, not the first half but after the middle of this very long period.
Anastasius writes about serfdom, "so basically on ownership of PEOPLE, usually the limiting factor was viability of manpower not land or resources." I think we need to give a nuance of perspective here. Serfdom like slavery was basically the ownership of people, though not with absolute rights for the owner with serfdom. But one might observe that every type of slavery, or similar system like serfdom in the feudal Middle Ages, was different according to time and geography. Slavery in Mesopotamia, in the Bible, in Greece, Rome, China, India, Africa, Islam, Pre-Columbian America, during the transatlantic slave trade depending on each country etc., was always different and codified in different ways. Regarding serfdom, the "limiting factor" [of not killing them or selling them], in my opinion, beyond the codification, was indeed viability just as for slaves, because slaves and serfs had value and were the indispensable and sole work power with animals. You don't kill your capital unless you have to, but this may go, (and indeed went) with a lot of abuse with no or very little recourse of the law.
And when you write "not land," I beg to disagree. All the time in human history since the invention of agriculture, land was the major marker of wealth and power, of course along with manpower ownership. This was more or less absolute (less absolute during the Roman Empire for instance regarding land when wealth and prestige had other avenues), but land ownership was the absolute cornerstone of the medieval society with, of course, the means to exploit it: humans (with serfdom and rents) and animals, woven in a complex web of loyalties, military obligations, levels of land ownership and transmissions through lineage and marriage within the diverse lord class of nobility. The system started to change with the development of commerce and free cities in the late Middle Ages, with the trauma of the black plague and the Hundred Year War, leading to a slow erosion of the system and a long transition to capitalism.
Regarding the techniques, the end of antiquity was a massive loss of knowledge, comfort, commerce,, intellectual life in every possible domain. Very little can compare in the Middle Ages as a whole, with the sophistication of Greece or the Roman Empire. Yet it is true that during the feudal system of the Middle Ages, new technologies were introduced, in a large part because of the decline of classical slavery.
The water mill technique appeared at the earliest in the 11th century in Europe. These mills were known in the Middle East (first traces in antique Egypt). With slavery, the Romans and the previous lords of the Middle Ages didn't have a need for it.
The very first wind mill appeared later in Europe, during the very late 12th century, and had existed for centuries earlier in Iran, Afghanistan and today's Pakistan.
The first horse collar appeared in Europe during the 10th century, and became widespread during the feudal period.
Architecture techniques were almost completely lost after the fall of the Roman empire (officially 476 AD) and cities were abandoned. The building of romanesque style churches from the middle of the 11th century can be considered a first modest architectural "renaissance." This was soon followed by the building of the first stone castles after the Normand conquest of England (1066), followed by the castle "boom" of the 12th and 13th centuries, as were stone city walls erected with the rebirth of cities. Finally, the gothic style techniques revolutionized the construction of clerical buildings from the early 12th century, first with the Abbey of St. Denis and the Cathedral of Sens (in France), then spread through Europe like a wildfire.
Regarding serfdom, it was the rule for a long time in the feudal society, but there were also peregrines (as Anasthasius points out) and even free peasants with servants (the word "servant" itself bearing its origin of "servitude"), and a fledging bourgeoisie. History was constantly evolving during the European Middle Ages. This also happened after capitalism was firmly established; there were many, evolving types of capitalism, which is still evolving.
no fossil fuels no mining no renewable energy systems to build no money we can not buy an electric car no money we can not pay for our electricty or heat pump our or drinking water nor pay our house rent so is it stil worth living then ????
Some people certainly bought and sold a lot of stuff during (and immediately after) the pandemic... just in the USA, Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg and Warren Buffet increased their collective wealth by over a trillion dollars, IIRC.
But not the vast majority of us. Conspicuous consumption is not for the proles ...
when will fossil feuls peak then and does that mean we won't be able to buy annything i plan to buy and electric car in 2027 ?