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Money and credit - Ivanov VM

introduction

Money is so firmly established in our everyday life, we do not see anything unusual in them. And yet it is one of the most remarkable inventions of man. It is not presenting themselves any significant value, they serve as a measure of the value of all the things around us, and have the ability to turn into any of them. What explains this magical power of money? Why, when and by whom they were invented?

So goods. This word can be defined as any product of human labor, is intended for use by the manufacturer, as well as to exchange for other products or for sale.

The properties of the goods, expressed in ability to meet certain human needs, is called use-value. For example, the salt is to use it for its cooking, in a coat - in the cold human. The subject that has no use value, can not become a commodity: after all, no one will agree to buy a useless thing.

Thus, the commodity - product, vital, or at least only useful for many people. In other words, he uses more or less demand and therefore is suitable for exchange. So, for two pairs of shoes, you can get one suit, which, in turn, can be exchanged for a dozen shirts.

The proportion in which one product can be exchanged for another, expresses its exchange value. How this is determined commensurate? For example, how to set the value relations between an umbrella and a pencil, a kilo of sugar and a typewriter? Perhaps comparing the usefulness of each? But precisely because they can be used to exchange the character of use value does not approach, but rather pushes them apart.

We need to find something in common, unifying qualitatively huge variety of commodity products, and at the same time separating them quantitatively. This is a general human labor. Without exception, all items - works of labor, differing only in the amount of physical and mental energy expended in their production. If one object is exchanged for the other ten, this means that their production require ten times as much effort. So, it is ten times more expensive.

Ancient Greek geographer and historian Strabo said: "One Arab tribe 2 pounds of gold were considered equivalent 1 pound of silver and 10 pounds - 1 pound of iron." As described them time mining gold sand required by the backward Arab tribes relatively small effort. Gold occurs in native form and free from impurities. The nature itself took over the job of leaching it from the soil. As a result, per capita share remained relatively uncomplicated work - to extract the yellow metal from the river bottom or alluvial land. A different pattern was observed in the extraction of silver, associated with severe rudokopnymi work. Obtaining pure iron preceded more laborious process of chemical separation from impurities, which require a relatively high technological preparation. Strabo, therefore, it is quite plausible.

So, market transactions are not something other than the exchange of one type of labor to another, although the owners of commodities, and not know it. The ability to personalize the material things called human labor cost. When product assessment does not take into account the volume of work of each individual production. Common to all commodities is not the concrete labor of a definite branch of production, not labor of one particular kind, but abstract human labor.

In the early stages of development of human society, when commodity production was of a random nature, determine the cost of a few items to be exchanged, it was simple enough. Improved tools and complexity of his expertise contributed to the expansion of product range. Now each individual product traded in the market, opposed by hundreds of thousands of others.

The author of the legendary "Iliad" Homer recounting the Trojan War, described pastime host: "... the men of the Achaean Mena buying wine: those for ringing copper, iron sedoe for me, those of cowhide or sharp-horned oxen, those of their polonennyh ... "

The reality of such trade is confirmed by many facts of the more recent past. Outstanding English explorer D. Livingstone from 1840 to 1873, made some long expeditions into the interior of the southern and central regions of the African continent. Pursuing research, he kept a diary, Pestryaev records of this kind: "January 1, 1868 bought 5 hoes 2-3 yards of calico per piece ... When we arrive in Bui-D, you will be able to buy such a good hoe goat .. . "May 21, 1871 reads:". What a lively spectacle - the fish market Sellers rush on the market with pottery, full of snails and small fish, they try to exchange the victuals to feed Mannock Everyone wants to go all out to exchange food and vengeance touted. her or scold someone else. "

The Roman Emperor Gaius Caesar Caligula, to limit exhausted treasury, but being sure that any of its whim - the law for all, announced the money ordinary shells collected on the beach.

In medieval Europe the individual levies were calculated in different weight amounts of pepper and incredibly rich people stuck derisive nickname of "pepper bag". And absolutely outlandish money - fairies - today traded on the island of Yap. The constancy of their value is guaranteed difficulty of production, transportation complexity of the island: the raw material for their production is the mineral aragonite. Fairies are resembling millstones circles with a hole in the center. The diameter of up to several meters, weight - one ton. After the conclusion of a trade transaction dealer marks your fairy familiar with peace of mind and leaves it in the same place.

It is impossible to give a complete list of items that are in different nations were money. Here are some of them: the fish - Iceland (XV c.), Shapeless pieces of jade - China (in the XIX century.), The pearl - India, cow skull - the island of Borneo, the so-called pork money used for the purchase of pigs and as a ransom for bride - strung on a cord fangs and tails of pigs, dogs teeth, glass beads and shells.

Typically, the original role of money on the same market simultaneously perform multiple product types, having naturally unequal value. They acted as a unit of payment of various denominations. Such monetary system characterized by more backward peoples, who, being under the yoke of the developed capitalist countries, for a long time enjoyed the usual trademarks of their money from the recalculation of the course of their treatment on the money that came with the colonizers.

Goods, for the first time acted as universal money, almost all nations was livestock.

Using animals as a measure of wealth and money is not a feature of the bygone days. And today it continues to be an essential measure of money in some African tribes.

Scott, however, could not fully satisfy all the requests of the market circulation. This kind of money required for the maintenance costs, was inconvenient to transport over long distances, is not suitable for small-scale commercial transactions, are the most frequent.

Improve and expand economic relations require new money, which would have the following qualities:

• more or less high and constant value, ie, the famous labor-intensive production..;

• limited in comparison with other commodities, use-value;

.. • compactness, ie, sufficiently large value in a small volume and, as a consequence, the convenience for the long haul;

• the ability to break up into small stake and join in any quantity while preserving its qualities;

• physical durability.

All these requirements are met by only metals, especially precious. Therefore, they eventually became leading in the implementation of the role of money and the personification of all.

First metal money were as shapeless ingots or various products. Appearance domonetnyh metallic money was varied: in ancient China - copper and bronze miniature knives, hoes, bells, Greece - iron bars, in Africa - spear or a small hatchet.

The spread and consolidation of metallic money was accompanied by a process of formation of the following main functions:

• the cost of the action - the ability to evaluate any product;

• means of circulation - acting as an intermediary in the exchange of one commodity for another;

• a means of accumulation - the formation of monetary reserves, temporarily not involved in the treatment;

• a means of payment - the ability to enter into circulation, regardless of circulation of goods;

• the world's money - the free circulation of money from precious metals outside the defined national boundaries.