The Prosperity of Physical Currency There are countless examples of the use of physical currency in Historical Records, Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, and some scholars even think that physical currency occupied a dominant position in the circulation field during this period. The decline of commodity economy and the destruction of metal currency use system are the main reasons for the prosperity of physical currency in Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties.
First of all, the political environment in the Han Dynasty was stable, the social productive forces increased rapidly, the commodity supply in the market also increased greatly, and the commodity economy flourished. In this context, people are willing to take more surplus products to the market to participate in the exchange, so as to harvest a certain amount of money. There are even a large number of businessmen in the commodity market who specialize in various commodities as a way to obtain more money.
This phenomenon is determined by the characteristics of money itself. "Money is a portable value storage means." Converting surplus products into money in time not only avoids the direct exchange of labor and commodities, but also stores the value of surplus products in a more convenient way. Of course, the guarantee of monetary credit is the premise for people to turn products into money in time, and the Western Han Dynasty, which was highly centralized in feudalism, met this requirement. It can be seen that at this time, the goal of merchants (businessmen) selling surplus products is whether they can obtain money containing profits, not the goods themselves, and buying goods is only a means for people to obtain money.
Secondly, as mentioned above, the constant depreciation of metal currency during the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties not only directly led to the rampant private casting and stolen casting, but also further stimulated evil money to occupy the market. With the destruction of the metal currency use system, the credibility of the government issuing currency eventually lost. At this time, people are reluctant to use those false values with poor quality and unworthy of the name, which is not only not conducive to exchange, but also makes users suffer economic losses.
Therefore, the decline of commodity economy and the destruction of metal currency use system are the main reasons for the prosperity of physical currency in Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties. In the past, many scholars regarded war, France and copper as the reasons for the prosperity of physical currency. In fact, this is only an external condition that affects the prosperity of physical currency, and the real reason is bound to be influenced and dominated by the law of commodity exchange and the monetary system.
Changes in the Monetary Policy of the Feudal Government Since the issue of five baht coins, the Western Han government has implemented a relatively stable monetary policy. Judging from the coins unearthed in archaeology, there was basically no phenomenon of losing weight throughout the Western Han Dynasty, which also shows that the original intention of the rulers of the Western Han Dynasty to formulate monetary policy has always been to promote social and economic development. In the Eastern Han Dynasty, coins began to lose weight, and excessive supply accelerated the depreciation of coins, which led to the phenomenon of "expensive things" and "cheap money" during Zhang's rule. In the period of Emperor Huan, the state of "goods are lighter than money, leading to poverty" appeared again.
Therefore, some people in the imperial court suggested that the monetary policy of "not casting money" and "casting big money instead" be promulgated and implemented. Although these two suggestions were not fully recognized after discussion by ministers, they inadvertently influenced the following centuries and became the "standard law" for the court to solve the currency problem in Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties for hundreds of years.
Rulers cast a lot of money, the purpose is nothing more than to obtain more interest difference of casting money by greatly increasing the nominal value of money, as the funds for the normal operation of the feudal government. Although the big monetary policy can rapidly increase the national income in a short time, it is at the expense of the people's interests, and it will also bring hyperinflation.
Affected by this, the new regime established next can only adopt the policy of not casting money to slowly consume the financial environment with too much money. The Western Jin government carried out the monetary policy of not casting money, which was the original intention of the rulers. If the government does not invest money for a long time, it will also have serious consequences. The most direct thing is the intensification of deflation, which leads to deflation.
At this time, it is the people who suffer. Because they have little money, they have to bear the pressure of currency appreciation. Eventually, the gap between the rich and the poor in society widened and class contradictions became more acute. Since then, the Southern Dynasties and the Northern Dynasties have also implemented monetary policies of "not casting money" and "casting big money" to varying degrees.
Especially in the Southern Dynasties, there were cases of casting bad money and not casting bad money one after another, which also made the financial environment of the Southern Dynasties always under the double destruction of inflation and austerity. The government's policy of casting bad money, that is, currency devaluation, reduces the actual weight of coins and makes them break away from the nominal weight, thus generating a profit difference. Although the way is different from investing a lot of money, the result is the same.
It is worth noting that the great monetary policy formulated by the Northern Zhou regime was a great success because it belonged to the nature of foreign trade currency and exchanged gold and silver coins with high value. This is also the only successful example of the big capital policy. The monetary policy of casting big money or not is actually that the feudal government began to cast money as a means of making profits, and skillfully used these two monetary policies to exploit the people, which became the usual political means of rulers in Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, which is also different from the monetary policy in Han Dynasty.
Currency circulation is extremely chaotic. During the Qin and Han dynasties, the monetary system was unified, and five baht became the only legal tender in circulation throughout the country. Whether it is the settlement at the national level or the transaction in the private market, five baht can be seen everywhere, which can be said to be unimpeded.
This phenomenon changed obviously in the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, which is embodied in three aspects: first, the coins circulating in the market are no longer only a single five baht, but a state of mixed circulation of old and new money; Second, because the physical object once had a certain function of money, it entered the circulation field and was used with coins. Thirdly, compared with the circulation range of five baht coins in Han dynasty, the circulation range of coins in Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties is much narrower, mainly reflected in the obvious regional differences in the field of currency circulation. In other words, the types and ways of using money are different between different regions.
The direct cause of regional differences in currency circulation is the division of political power. In addition, the imbalance of regional economic development and the disunity of monetary system have also affected the process of this phenomenon to varying degrees. In a word, the unified and orderly currency circulation order in the Han Dynasty showed an obvious turning point in the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, and the currency circulation began to be gradually chaotic, which is also one of the most obvious characteristics of the times.
In a word, we can see from the monetary characteristics of Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties a stage which accords with the characteristics of China's feudal social and economic development, and a transitional period between two major monetary and economic climaxes. This period has the function of connecting the preceding with the following. Without all kinds of preparations and foundations for the development of currency in Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, the short-term reunification of Sui Dynasty may not be the five baht money circulating in the whole country, nor may it bring a peak to the monetary economy of Sui and Tang Dynasties.
Of course, today, we should correctly look at the mistakes of the monetary system in the historical period, especially the failure of diet coins as a special tool to exploit people. In this context, the negative impact and painful lessons brought by the chaos of the monetary system itself to the national economic construction and people's daily life are still vivid, and it also gives the most vivid historical enlightenment to future generations. Today, we can still draw lessons from the tortuous development of money in Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, which makes us realize more clearly that money should serve economic development and not be a tool for the ruling class to seek benefits.