Money Mischief: Episodes in Monetary History [Paperback]

Milton Friedman (Author)

Book Description

Series: Harvest Book | Publication Date: March 31, 1994

Friedman makes clear once and for all that no one is immune from monetary economics-that is, from the effects of its theory and its practices. He demonstrates through historical events the mischief that can result from misunderstanding the monetary system. Index.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

From the Micronesian Yap islands' 12-foot stone "coins" to today's paper currencies backed only by fiat, Nobel-laureate economist Friedman ( Free to Choose ) here examines anomalies of world monetary history, including the effect of successive 19th-century gold ore discoveries and refining improvements on U.S. and British tender. He traces American currency's long, contentious gold-silver bimetalist saga, marked by the so-called Congressional coinage "crime of 1873" and ending with William Jennings Bryan's unsuccessful "Cross of Gold" presidential campaign in 1896. Friedman cites harsh lessons from postwar hyperinflation in many countries and declares that Roosevelt's 1933 silver-buying program may have skewed China's silver-based economy toward eventual communism. Uncontrolled money growth is the cause of inflation, the author stresses, and only monetary reform, despite undesirable side effects like unemployment, can cure it. Abstruse, theoretical and chiefly for the initiate, the book recycles parts of earlier works by Friedman, who himself suggests here that the general reader might wish to skip a particularly challenging chapter.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

In this latest work, Nobel Prize-winning economist Friedman examines the role of money backed by gold and silver and our current world of fiat backed by faith. After an initial restatement of the essence of his monetary views, Friedman examines the historical impact of bimetallism in the United States and elsewhere. He devotes the remainder of the book to the principles and problems of modern money unlinked to any commodity. Often iconoclastic yet always persuasive, whatever Friedman has to say about money should always be read. Highly recommended for college and university libraries.
- Richard C. Schiming, Mankato State Univ., Minn.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Mariner Books (March 31, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 015661930X
• ISBN-13: 978-0156619301
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 4.6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (38 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,233 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #6 in Books > Business & Investing > Industries & Professions > Banks & Banking

More About the Author

Milton Friedman is a senior research fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and the Paul Snowden Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of Economics at the University of Chicago. In 1976 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in economics. He has written a number of books, including two with his wife, Rose D. Friedman---the bestselling Free to Choose and Two Lucky People: Memoirs, the latter published by the University of Chicago Press.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

115 of 119 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Power of Monetary Thinking, March 10, 2004

By 

Omer Belsky (Haifa, Israel) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Money Mischief: Episodes in Monetary History (Paperback)

In his best selling study, Robert L. Heilbroner calls Economists 'The worldly philosophers'. That description certainly captures what Milton Friedman does in this book - he takes the seemingly simple concept of money, the unit of exchange we use daily and rarely reflect upon, and demonstrates how complicated the issues regarding it are.

(As an interesting aside, Heilbroner's original title for his book was 'the money philosophers' - a definition that fits Friedman in this book even better then his chosen title, even if it is too narrow to account for all of economics).

More then half of this collection of essays is about the so-called 'Crime of 1873' - America's decision, following the issuance of fiat money (that is, money irredeemable in specie) during the Civil War, to peg the dollar not to both silver and gold, but to gold alone. This seemingly arcane and academic topic was a major political issue in the 1880s and 90s, climaxing with the nomination of the silver Democrat, William Jennings Bryan to the presidency of the United States in 1896.

As the Unites States, along with most other 19th century nations such as Germany and France, followed Great Britain in adopting the gold standard, the price of gold rose in terms of other resources, so prices went down. Therefore there was a severe deflation causing much unrest and discontent.

The cure to the deflation came not through political or monetary means, however, but because of an invention of a method to extract gold from low grade ore. This increased the supply of gold, lowered its prices. Hence stopping the deflation, and killing the presidential ambitions of William Jennings Bryan.

The rest of the book describes various issues, from FDR's decision to 'help silver' which helped Communism in China instead (by increasing the cost of silver, overvaluing the Chinese currency and thus hurting Chinese exports and undermining the Chinese economy), to the policy of pegging a currency to the dollar (not a good idea as it subjects the country to the whims of the world economy. The policy was a grave failure to Chile and a great success to Israel, due entirely to external changes in the value of the dollar).

The theme of the later parts of the book is undoubtedly inflation. Friedman demonstrates his claim that inflation is "always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon" (p.104). Inflation is caused by government increasing the money supply, although one time price increases may be caused by unfortunate outside events (like Arabs reduction of the exportation of oil in the early 1979s).

Although Friedman is well known as an economic right winger, there is nothing in this account that should be displeasing to anyone from the left - Friedman's case is against mismanagement, not for small or big governments. Nor is there any argument about whether government spending should go to the military, to welfare, or to any other cause. Although Friedman's book is filled with stories of the political economy, its moral is politically neutral. Indeed, Friedman clearly discusses how inflation is often used by governments because direct taxation is unpopular (p.205) - can you say "read my lips, no new taxes"?

Furthermore, the economic analysis of some reviewers in Amazon is shaky. Friedman writes "all these adjustments [the negative effects of inflation] are set in motion by changes in the rates of monetary growth and inflation. If monetary growth was high but steady... the economy would adjust to it. ... Such an inflation would do no great harm " (p.222).

Although Friedman does not like inflation, he actually makes a case for it, at least at a low single digit level. Since people are usually sellers of few things and purchasers of many, they are more aware of the increase in the price of the commodity they sell then they are of the increase of general prices, especially when those changes are low. People like to see their income go up, as they feel it is a just reward for their efforts (p. 70).

'Money Mischief' is an interesting, challenging book. Its chapters vary from the extremely technical and difficult, (notably chapter 4, a counter-factual exercise estimating the effect of continuing bimetallism after 1873), to 'pop economics' chapters which are no less enlightening and easier to read.

The book ends with a discussion of the new experiment started in the 1970s - currency which is entirely unredeemable by any kind of good. Earlier economists thought that this was impossible, and would necessarily lead to high inflation, but Friedman is optimistic - he believes that aware and well informed public and decision makers can pressure the government against unduly increasing the money supply. Thus, widespread understanding of economics is the real cure for inflation.

46 of 48 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great introdcution to the importance of monetary policy, December 8, 2002

By 

Craig Matteson (Saline, MI) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Money Mischief: Episodes in Monetary History (Paperback)

I must confess of my unbounded admiration for Milton Friedman. He has contributed so much to our understanding of the effects of monetary policy and has been such a tireless advocate for freedom that I must admit I am not impartial in any way, so readers beware.

This book examines 10 different episodes in world history in which seemingly trivial policy choices towards money had profound, unexpected, and unforeseen consequences (usually very bad). They make enjoyable reading and are most educational.

The discussions are not all that technical and, to me, sparkle with wit and insight. This book can serve as a great introduction to how gold and silver money was abused, the effect that minting rights can have, how technology changes in mining precious metals caused a crisis of devaluation, what the heck bimetallism is and what the issues around it were (are), and most important, the risks of the kind of money we have (fiat money - because it is not tied explicitly to some kind of commodity and is therefore at the risk of somebody running the printing press too much). This is all great stuff. Enjoy!

There are several useful graphs and tables. Also, a reference list in the back can act as a bibliography for further reading.

51 of 55 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars AIMED AT MONETARY ECONOMISTS, NOT A GENERALIST BOOK, February 9, 2005

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Denis Benchimol Minev "Amazonia" (Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Money Mischief: Episodes in Monetary History (Paperback)

Many of Milton Friedman's previous books, especially "Free to Choose" are aimed at a popular audience, supporting the cause for freedom in many different aspects of society. With it, this book shares the brilliance and throughness of thought employed by Friedman, perhaps the most well known (if not the best) economist of the 2nd half of the 20th century.

In "Money Mischief" Friedman enters the realm of monetary economics, briefly telling a history of the different systems that have been employed through history for value conservation. Aside from perhpas the first 100 pages, the rest of the book relies on some notion of monetary economics and international trade and finance. Most of the book is devoted to the study of the old metallic or bimetallic standards and the early days of the fiat money system (the one most used today). An experienced economist will recognize the brilliance of the arguments linkings seemingly unrelated events such as the US elections in 1892 and the fall of the Chiang Kai-shek government in China (believe me, Friedman convinced me they were directly linked).

For a non-economist, the first one hundred pages may tell a brief history of money, so if that is your interest, stop there. Experienced economists will definitely enjoy the suddle linkages of events, such as deflations and the California gold rush and the development of the cyanide process for extracting gold. The book is aimed at a more knowledgeable crowd; with such an aim, it achieves its objective brilliantly.