However,
“The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people’s money.”
—Margaret Thatcher
We just print more, but sooner or later, Thatcher’s dictum will hold true.
Then the flood, fire and brimstone take over the cities.
Nothing new here, Thatcher may have been the latest one to be quoted. But the Romans did this regularly by debasing their coinage
The French did this a number of times, that is why we remember Friday the 13th - and do not remember the French implosion
Monetary confidence was briefly eroded by the disastrous paper money "System" introduced by John Law from 1716 to 1720.
Law, as Controller General of Finances, established France's first central bank, the Banque Royale,
initially founded as a private entity by Law in 1716 and nationalized in 1718.
The bank was entrusted with paying down the enormous debt accumulated through Louis XIV's wars
and stimulating the moribund French economy. Initially a great success, the bank's pursuit of French monopolies
led it to land speculation in Louisiana through the Mississippi Company, forming an economic bubble
in the process that eventually burst in 1720. The collapse of the Banque Royale and the paper currency which it issued
left a deep suspicion of the idea of a central bank; it was not until 80 years later that Napoleon established the Bank of France
and that lead to the French Revolution - sure looks like history may be repeating