Mountains of Debt: Crisis and Change in Renaissance Florence, Victorian Britain, and Postwar AmericaLike the United States today, Renaissance Florence and Victorian Britain were the richest, most dynamic economic systems of their times. Yet each succumbed to a fiscal crisis brought on by public debt and taxation and eventually fell into long-term economic decline. Now, public debt and taxation dominate the America policy agenda. Must the United States follow the same dismal pattern of fiscal crisis and economic decline? Mountains of Debt argues that it is not too late for the United States to change directions and suggests a comprehensive program for reform of American fiscal institutions that would reduce the deficit problem and at the same time reverse the long-term structural trends that are both the cause and the effect of the fiscal crisis today. Offering proposals for reducing the deficit, this new analysis could alter the current course of the United States economy. |
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... profits) because they did not produce anything real but just shuffled paper. This view of finance, which is widely held today at an intuitive level, is conditioned by our everyday lives, where we shuffle checks, bankbooks, bond ...
... profits) because they did not produce anything real but just shuffled paper. This view of finance, which is widely held today at an intuitive level, is conditioned by our everyday lives, where we shuffle checks, bankbooks, bond ...
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... profits from manufacturing. Florentine entrepreneurs organized the production of the cloth and took profits from these ventures, to be sure, but their largest profits came through the trade and finance activities that were associated ...
... profits from manufacturing. Florentine entrepreneurs organized the production of the cloth and took profits from these ventures, to be sure, but their largest profits came through the trade and finance activities that were associated ...
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... profit in lending today at full weight to be repaid tomorrow in light coin. The Florentines themselves supplied the solution to this problem in 1252 when they began minting the gold florin. The florin was probably the most stable unit ...
... profit in lending today at full weight to be repaid tomorrow in light coin. The Florentines themselves supplied the solution to this problem in 1252 when they began minting the gold florin. The florin was probably the most stable unit ...
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... profit.”30 But these problems pale compared to the disasters that befell the commune in the 1340s. The economic and social environment changed radically during the 1340s; the effects were felt everywhere in the Florentine state and ...
... profit.”30 But these problems pale compared to the disasters that befell the commune in the 1340s. The economic and social environment changed radically during the 1340s; the effects were felt everywhere in the Florentine state and ...
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Contents
Mountains of Debt and the Heart of Florence | |
Britain and the Industrial Revolution | |
The Odious Tax and the Standing Miracle | |
The American Century and the American Crisis | |
The Changing Structure of American Government | |
The New Mountains of Debt | |
Saddle Points | |
Changing Directions | |
NOTES | |
BIBLIOGRAPHY | |
INDEX | |
Other editions - View all
Mountains of Debt: Crisis and Change in Renaissance Florence, Victorian ... Michael Veseth No preview available - 1990 |
Common terms and phrases
baby boom banks Black Death budget capital catasto change and fiscal Ciompi cloth commune’s consumption Corn Laws corporate Cosimo costs created deficit domestic dowry fund economic growth effect entrepreneurs example factors federal fifth element finance financial markets firms fiscal balance fiscal crisis fiscal imbalance flat tax Florence’s Florentine economy florin foreign government’s growing guilds important incentives income tax increase Industrial Revolution innovations institutions interest investment labor living standards longterm manufacturing Medici Medici bank Monte Commune Monte shares Napoleonic Wars national debt needed outlays pattern Peace of Lodi Peel’s percent perhaps period political population postwar private sector problem production profits programs public debt Renaissance Florence rigid rise role saddle point shift shortterm social insurance social security structural change tax burden tax expenditures tax rates tax reform tax system trade trend U.S. economy United Victorian Britain wealth workers world economy