🚀 go-pugleaf

shafer@skipper.dfrf.nasa.gov (Mary Shafer) writes:
>The gold and silver that the Spanish brought back from the New World
>messed up the European economy quite greviously.  Galloping inflation,
>with too much money (precious metals, of course) chasing too few goods.
>This caused a lot of instability, first economic and then political.

	When the Spanish brought back their riches, Europe's
currency was essentially based on precious metals.  Gold and
silver do have more influence than most commodities, but
an infusion of a larg amount of gold would have little effect 
on the whole world economy compared to what Europe experienced
in the mercatilist age.  Besides, the need to open new markets
and to grow certainly outweighs any minor dislocations in the
process.  Europe may have experienced a little shake - up
when their metal currency was debased, but the summ effect of
colonialization provided a tremendous boost to the European economy.

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Bryan Siegfried			Biology and Economics at UIUC
zig@uiuc.edu