The great inflation of the 1500s is echoing eerily today
P1:In the days of Henry Viii，England seemed to be falling apart.
场景描述:beggars cut your throat
the currency was being debased
morals were as degraded as the coinage
The burial/funeral was turned to boozing and belly-cheer
with an orgy involving
The feeling was shared across Europe，which by the 1590s was consumed by financial crisis，social unrest and war
P2：the root of the chaos was a wholly unexpected，and wolly unfamiliar
surge in inflation
300 years leading up to the 1500s🆚1500s
modern-day Japan 🆚Zimbabwe
England： in 1500 no higher than it had been in 1275
P3:all this changed afer 1500
Sustained（持续的）price inflation became unstoppable
1550s：Egland had doubles
1550s before long：Italian 5%
end of the century：France&Holland 4%
1530s：Russia pick up
almost any level of inflation made people poorer
P4:The inflationary surge also lasted a long time
Some countries suffered more than others
Scottish a lot worse than English
Dutch might have been the worst
P5&P6:the cause of the great inflation
1500s
M：excessive spending
JB： unexpected shocks to the global economic system were to blame
furiously disagreed over
today‘s historians
S
K
P7:author：after the Black Death➡️the population had grown fast，farmers moved to city➡️excess demand（for food）➡️monarchs goosed the economy by manipulated the currency
P8:monarchs manipulated
Henry VIII’s great debasement：involved taking one gold coin，melting it down，adding worthless metal ，and then recasting it as two gloden cions➡️plucked coins out of thin air➡️2% of GDP，spend the extra cash on wars and palaces➡️the resulting boost to nominal demand provoked merchants to raise their prices
Edward VI
Scotland double down
Netherlands，Belgium and Luxembourg，the silver coinage was debased 12 times
P9:debasement not the whole reasons
France
many countries
Spain
historian（author）：what was happening across the Atlantic，（概括性同位语）the source（happening）of a huge supply shock Europe‘s to economy
