When it comes to paper money, Chinese can be proud, but they should also reflect.

It is known that paper money appeared in the Song Dynasty, when European countries were still in the Middle Ages. The most powerful in the world at that time were the Song Empire and the Alaber Empire. At that time, the famous traveler of the Alaber Empire visited the Song Dynasty and praised Quanzhou's city management as the most efficient port he had ever seen, and praised Hangzhou as the greatest city in the world.

The Song dynasty is best known for its contribution to movable type printing. Paper money could have reached the same status as movable type printing as the most important invention in the history of the world, but unfortunately the management of paper money did not survive.

This is not to blame the people of the Song Dynasty. The appearance of paper money in the Song Dynasty was brought about by commercial development, and it first appeared in Sichuan. It was invented by merchants, because Sichuan was short of copper at that time, and a large number of iron coins were used, and iron coins were cumbersome, and sometimes more iron coins were used in bulk transactions than goods.

Some merchants in the Song Dynasty gradually began to guarantee trade by printing paper stamps corresponding to the number, called jiaozi. Large-scale trade began to use these banknotes, which were guaranteed by wealthy merchants, and then returned for exchange.

Paper money is a favorable financial instrument, which has gradually become mainstream in Sichuan. After the Song Dynasty government discovered the mystery, they appreciated it very much. But he was worried about the disadvantages of this tool in private hands, so he began to intervene, set up Jiaozi in Sichuan, and sent Beijing officials to supervise the printing.

However, once the power to print money is in the hands of an unsupervised government, it often leads to indiscriminate distribution, because the government has enough incentive to print more. Therefore, the Jiaozi of the Song Dynasty also often depreciated, and the official Jiaozi that lasted for more than 80 years was forced to stop issuance, and then introduced another kind of paper money, called Qian Yin. But the depreciation of the money quotation is faster because the money quotation is not allowed to be exchanged.

Although the management of paper money in the Song Dynasty was not good, it was an exploration after all, and it was maintained until the fall of the Song Dynasty.

In the Yuan Dynasty, the Mongols did value the role of Song Dynasty paper money, and Kublai Khan once asked people to exchange real money and silver, trying to maintain the value of paper money, but the Mongols printed money more unrestrained than the Song Dynasty, and as a result, paper money did not become a tool to facilitate commerce, but became a tool to plunder the people.

In the Ming Dynasty, the old Zhu family did worse than the Mongols. Kublai Khan at least knew that paper money needed reserves, and Zhu Yuanzhang's original purpose in printing paper money was only to reward meritorious heroes. Use the imperial power to impose that everyone must collect. But the government did not have any idea of exchange, as a result, Zhu Yuanzhang issued treasure banknotes indiscriminately, and in the period of his son Zhu Di, in order to maintain the value of treasure banknotes, he made some efforts, but Zhu Di was reluctant to take out real money to exchange paper money, and he was not stupid, why should he exchange money for paper. The measure he took was to let all the tax cards that passed through the customs be collected. Therefore, the pass of the Ming Dynasty is also called the banknote pass.

But while collecting the treasure money, it continued to be issued, and the rotten banknotes were unwilling to be collected. Later, Zhu Di's successor thought that the treasure banknote was really a disaster for the country and the people, and it was permanently abolished.

In the Qing Dynasty, it was also generally accepted that the banknotes "understood" by the Ming Dynasty were just tools to rob the people's wealth, so the Qing Dynasty no longer printed banknotes, knowing that during the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom period, there was really no money to print for a while.

It was originally a creative tool, but it was played rotten by the government of the Song, Yuan, and Ming dynasties, which cannot but be said to be a pity.

Paper money in Western history is said to have been printed by the Bank of Sweden at the earliest, but the Swedes soon stopped printing it themselves. Therefore, it is actually the Dutch who have come up with that set in the same vein.

It was not consciously designed by the Dutch, just like the wealthy merchants of the Song Dynasty, it was a feedback to the market. The inventor was the Dutch Bank of Amsterdam, whose shareholders overlapped with those of the Dutch East India Company, and were arguably the most knowledgeable and experienced in business at the time.

They invented paper money, mainly to facilitate banking, so their paper money is a bank note. It can even be said to be a customer's stub. At that time, there were hundreds of currencies in Europe, and the Bank of Amsterdam standardized its operations, and its largest business was almost currency exchange. The client deposits the currencies of various countries into the Bank of Amsterdam, which gives the client a certificate of deposit converted to guilders. With the certificate of deposit, the customer can go to the bank at any time to exchange the gold and silver coins. Later, it was said that the appointment ticket did not recognize people, and there was a feeling of a silver ticket. No matter who holds the certificate of deposit, they can withdraw money, and this standardized certificate of deposit has a circulation effect and can be circulated between different people. It also has the function of currency. Because of the creditworthiness and integrity of the Bank of Amsterdam, as well as its power, even hostile countries that were at war with the Dutch were able to withdraw money from the Amsterdam treasury with a certificate of deposit, which led to the unanimous approval of such bank notes.

After the development of British commerce and finance, basically the use of the Dutch set of commercial system and system, British banks also printed their own bank notes, London financiers through their own strength, to lend to the government, from the government to obtain a concession, the establishment of the Bank of England, and began to print pounds, but the pound is still a bank note, is linked to gold and silver coins, and in 1833, the Bank of England obtained unlimited legal solvency, The Bank of England's bank notes officially became paper money in the modern sense.

Zhou Lang learned more about the issuance model of European bank bills from the Dutch.

After comparison, he found that Western banknotes have been closely linked to banks as financial institutions since their inception. And Chinese banknotes are too precocious, and they are controlled by the government early. The government was in charge of the issuance of banknotes, which should have brought more solid credit to banknotes, but the government's power above all else made him no longer subject to the restrictions of commercial laws, resulting in paper money losing its commercial significance and becoming a tool of the government.

Zhou Lang believes that even if he masters the issuance of banknotes, he will not issue them indiscriminately, because he knows the dangers. But when he proposed to print banknotes, nine of his ten subordinates objected, and Wei Lianli, the only one who did not object, and Zhou Lang did not believe in his integrity.

What is the connotation of paper money, the British in this era must think that it is gold and silver coins, and it is gold content, but Zhou Lang understands that the connotation of paper money lies in credit, and gold and silver coins are just tools to give paper money credit. Zhou Lang wants to issue banknotes, and even the officials under him can't win the trust, how to win the trust of the people.

This is the result of the banknotes being played by the old Zhu family, which caused a lot of trouble to Zhou Lang.

It is useless to make others believe that the paper money you issue is useful, and the paper money must be given credit, which has to follow the old road of linking gold and silver currency, which is the most direct and effective way.

Therefore, the preliminary work of printing banknotes, in fact, is coinage, Zhou Lang coinage, not to collect seigniorage, nor to prosper trade, now the currency circulating in Guangzhou, mainly money, Manchu minting money, 1 Wen weight 1 money, copper-lead alloy, Kangxi time is 1 to 1, Yongzheng after the change to copper 4 lead 6 ratio.

Zhou Lang originally planned to use pure copper to cast copper coins, he imported a large amount of copper from Japan, because now it has been switched to iron cast cannons, these copper has been stored as raw materials for coinage, but lead as a military material, with the expansion of the number of Zhou Lang's troops, even imported from India, although the value of lead is not high, but the military significance is significant, so Zhou Lang intends to reduce the waste of lead.

However, when he discussed with several old superintendents of the Fujian Mint Bureau, the other party tried hard to advise Zhou Lang not to reduce the lead content. The Manchu Qing Dynasty set up coinage bureaus all over the country, and where there was copper, there was a coinage bureau, although Fujian did not produce copper, but a large amount of copper could be obtained through trade, so Fujian also had a coinage bureau. After Zhou Lang occupied Fujian, a number of local households from the Minting Bureau took refuge in Zhou Lang. They told Zhou Lang that this ratio could not be changed indiscriminately.

Zhou Lang is actually not firm, he still understands the principle of bad money driving out good money, but he is now in power, and he can cut off the import of bad money from the Manchu Dynasty. What he didn't expect was that the old craftsman of the Minting Bureau told Zhou Lang that the reason why a large amount of lead was added to the copper coins of the Manchu Qing Dynasty was not for profit, and the purpose of collecting seigniorage was to prevent private casting. Even with the current ratio of copper to 4 lead to 6, there are still coppersmiths who smelt copper coins to make other bronze objects. The old craftsmen suggested that the ratio of copper 3 lead 7, or copper 2 lead 8, should be changed to the ratio of copper 2 lead 8, so that no one would melt it.

Zhou Lang was puzzled when he listened, but this is the reality.

Since Zhang Juzheng of the Ming Dynasty reformed and implemented a whip law, China's monetary system has entered the era of silver and money restandard, and the government controls the exchange rate of silver and money to regulate finance. The government believes that as long as the ratio of silver to money remains stable, the market is stable.

Therefore, maintaining the proportion of money has always been the direction of efforts. However, due to the scarcity of silver and copper in China, especially copper, the demand is too large, and it cannot meet the market circulation just by casting money, which leads to the long-term phenomenon of expensive and cheap money during the Kangxi period, and one or two silver can only be exchanged for 800 wen money, or even only more than 700 wen.

The government collects taxes in silver, but in the daily life of the people, the value of silver is too high, so the people generally use copper money, money is expensive and silver is cheap, affecting the lives of the people, and the government has been trying to regulate this.

Until the early days of Qianlong, this kind of problem was still not solved, and the governors in various places reported that money was expensive and silver was cheap, and hoped that the government would mint new money. In October of the ninth year of Qianlong, due to the "Beijing division in recent years. Money is expensive", the university scholar Ortai even has eight articles of the money law, hoping to curb this phenomenon:

1. Bronze creation, that is, collecting all kinds of copper, melting and minting money; Second, the pawnshops in the capital. It is advisable to lend money to the principal as appropriate. Three thousand taels of silver were to be distributed. Listen to its operations. and shall receive two taels of silver. Preserved as a book. Twenty-four strings of money are paid every day; 3. The official rice bureau sells rice money. Each game was given two thousand five hundred taels of silver. Buying rice stones. Will sell rice for money. Once every three days. Go to the city of Yiyin Exchange Department; Fourth, the pawnshops in the capital. Accumulate money now. It is advisable to send the bureau according to the number of money, and each big one should be one, and three hundred strings of money should be made. Small when one, out of the money of a hundred strings. All of them are transported by themselves. Sold by the traffic officer. Successive repayments of the silver; 5. Money market brokerage. It should be combined in one place. Officials are audits. to the price of the deaf; Sixth, the Beijing guest grain store. Buying miscellaneous grains. It is advisable to prohibit the exercise of money; Seventh, the capital of Qianwen. It is strictly forbidden to go out of Beijing to sell; 8. Hoarding money in places near Beijing. It is advisable to strictly prohibit and prohibit hoarding of more than 100 strings.

These eight methods are to increase the quantity of copper coins, suppress the high price of money, and even hope to collect all kinds of copper utensils, melt and mint money, lend the government's silver to pawnshops for operation, let the pawnshops hand over the copper coins to the government, and also let the government's rice bureau sell the money to the market once every three days for silver, so that the money will flow into the market as soon as possible, and the phenomenon of hoarding copper coins must be strictly investigated. In ancient times, these civil officials still had some knowledge of the principles of economics, although they were not as good as the experts of later generations, but they were still much stronger than ordinary people.

Unfortunately, it backfired, these methods treat the symptoms but not the root cause, and the policy means can be suppressed for a while, and when the market adapts to the policy, there will be a retaliatory rebound.