IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/eecrev/v157y2023ics0014292123001393.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Assignats or death: The politics and dynamics of hyperinflation in revolutionary France

Author

Listed:
  • Cutsinger, Bryan P.
  • Rouanet, Louis
  • Ingber, Joshua S.

Abstract

Following a revolution precipitated by unsustainable government deficits, an explosion of paper money called the assignat caused a rapid increase in prices not seen in Europe again until the widespread adoption of discretionary fiat standards in the 20th century. The value of the assignat depended on the property the revolutionary government had expropriated to back it. The decision to retire the assignats from circulation using the revenue collected from the sale of the expropriated property was ultimately a political one. We examine how shifts in the political equilibrium affected the demand for the assignat and find evidence of two money demand shocks that correspond to the collapse of the political support for the assignats. Our estimates of the demand for the assignat indicate that the first shock reduced the demand for real balances by up to 70%. The second shock caused the negative relationship between real balances and inflation to break down entirely. Our results point to politics’ critical role in determining a currency’s fiscal backing and, thus, the demand for money.

Suggested Citation

  • Cutsinger, Bryan P. & Rouanet, Louis & Ingber, Joshua S., 2023. "Assignats or death: The politics and dynamics of hyperinflation in revolutionary France," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:eecrev:v:157:y:2023:i:c:s0014292123001393
    DOI: 10.1016/j.euroecorev.2023.104510
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0014292123001393
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.euroecorev.2023.104510?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Peter N. Ireland, 2009. "On the Welfare Cost of Inflation and the Recent Behavior of Money Demand," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(3), pages 1040-1052, June.
    2. Farley Grubb, 2017. "Colonial Virginia's paper money regime, 1755–74: A forensic accounting reconstruction of the data," Historical Methods: A Journal of Quantitative and Interdisciplinary History, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 50(2), pages 96-112, April.
    3. Arrau, Patricio & De Gregorio, Jose & Reinhart, Carmen M. & Wickham, Peter, 1995. "The demand for money in developing countries: Assessing the role of financial innovation," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(2), pages 317-340, April.
    4. ByBenjamin M. Blau & Todd G. Griffith & Ryan J. Whitby, 2022. "Lobbying and lending by banks around the financial crisis by," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 192(3), pages 377-397, September.
    5. Calomiris, Charles W., 1988. "Institutional Failure, Monetary Scarcity, and the Depreciation of the Continental," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 48(1), pages 47-68, March.
    6. Peter L. Rousseau, 2007. "Backing, the Quantity Theory, and the Transition to the US Dollar, 1723–1850," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(2), pages 266-270, May.
    7. Robert J. Barro, 1983. "Inflationary Finance under Discretion and Rules," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 16(1), pages 1-16, February.
    8. Davig, Troy & Leeper, Eric M. & Walker, Todd B., 2011. "Inflation and the fiscal limit," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 31-47, January.
    9. Grubb, Farley, 2018. "Colonial Virginia's paper money, 1755–1774: value decomposition and performance," Financial History Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 25(2), pages 113-140, August.
    10. Taylor, Mark P, 1991. "The Hyperinflation Model of Money Demand Revisited," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 23(3), pages 327-351, August.
    11. Aisen, Ari & Veiga, Francisco Jose, 2006. "Does Political Instability Lead to Higher Inflation? A Panel Data Analysis," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 38(5), pages 1379-1389, August.
    12. Thomas J. Sargent, 1982. "The Ends of Four Big Inflations," NBER Chapters, in: Inflation: Causes and Effects, pages 41-98, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Hendrickson, Joshua R., 2020. "The Riksbank, emergency finance, policy experimentation, and Sweden’s reversal of fortune," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 171(C), pages 312-332.
    14. Selgin, George A, 1994. "On Ensuring the Acceptability of a New Fiat Money," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 26(4), pages 808-826, November.
    15. Sargent, Thomas J & Smith, Bruce D, 1987. "Irrelevance of Open Market Operations in Some Economies with Government Currency Being Dominated in Rate of Return," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 77(1), pages 78-92, March.
    16. Ronald W. Michener & Robert E. Wright, 2006. "Miscounting Money of Colonial America," Econ Journal Watch, Econ Journal Watch, vol. 3(1), pages 4-44, January.
    17. Peter Bernholz, 1988. "Inflation, Monetary Regime and the Financial Asset Theory of Money," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(1), pages 5-34, February.
    18. Farley Grubb, 2016. "Is Paper Money Just Paper Money? Experimentation and Variation in the Paper Monies Issued by the American Colonies from 1690 to 1775," Research in Economic History, in: Research in Economic History, volume 32, pages 147-224, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    19. Miller, Stephen Matteo & Ndhlela, Thandinkosi, 2020. "Money demand and seignorage maximization before the end of the Zimbabwean dollar," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).
    20. Jushan Bai & Pierre Perron, 1998. "Estimating and Testing Linear Models with Multiple Structural Changes," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 66(1), pages 47-78, January.
    21. Stock, James H & Watson, Mark W, 1993. "A Simple Estimator of Cointegrating Vectors in Higher Order Integrated Systems," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 61(4), pages 783-820, July.
    22. West, Robert Craig, 1978. "Money in the Colonial American Economy," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 16(1), pages 1-15, January.
    23. Barro, Robert J, 1972. "Inflationary Finance and the Welfare Cost of Inflation," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 80(5), pages 978-1001, Sept.-Oct.
    24. Wicker, Elmus, 1985. "Colonial Monetary Standards Contrasted: Evidence from the Seven Years' War," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 45(4), pages 869-884, December.
    25. Wallace, Neil, 1981. "A Modigliani-Miller Theorem for Open-Market Operations," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 71(3), pages 267-274, June.
    26. Gregory, Allan W. & Nason, James M. & Watt, David G., 1996. "Testing for structural breaks in cointegrated relationships," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 71(1-2), pages 321-341.
    27. Willard, Kristen L & Guinnane, Timothy W & Rosen, Harvey S, 1996. "Turning Points in the Civil War: Views from the Greenback Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(4), pages 1001-1018, September.
    28. Bordo, Michael D. & White, Eugene N., 1991. "A Tale of Two Currencies: British and French Finance During the Napoleonic Wars," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 51(2), pages 303-316, June.
    29. Bordo Michael D. & Kydland Finn E., 1995. "The Gold Standard As a Rule: An Essay in Exploration," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 32(4), pages 423-464, October.
    30. Aisen, Ari & Veiga, Francisco José, 2008. "The political economy of seigniorage," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(1), pages 29-50, August.
    31. Sargent, Thomas J & Velde, Francois R, 1995. "Macroeconomic Features of the French Revolution," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 103(3), pages 474-518, June.
    32. Rouanet, Louis, 2023. "Foutu maximum: The political economy of price controls and national defense in revolutionary France," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).
    33. Nicolini, Juan Pablo, 1996. "Ruling out speculative hyperinflations The role of the government," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 20(5), pages 791-809, May.
    34. Cochrane, John H., 2011. "Understanding policy in the great recession: Some unpleasant fiscal arithmetic," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 2-30, January.
    35. Phylaktis, Kate & Taylor, Mark P, 1993. "Money Demand, the Cagan Model and the Inflation Tax: Some Latin American Evidence," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 75(1), pages 32-37, February.
    36. Theresa Finley & Raphaël Franck & Noel D. Johnson, 2021. "The Effects of Land Redistribution: Evidence from the French Revolution," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 64(2), pages 233-267.
    37. Bryan P Cutsinger & Vincent Geloso & Mathieu Bédard, 2022. "The wild card: colonial paper money in French North America, 1685 to 1719 [Economic Structure and Agricultural Productivity in Europe, 1300–1800]," European Review of Economic History, European Historical Economics Society, vol. 26(2), pages 185-207.
    38. E. Levasseur, 1894. "The Assignats: A Study in the Finances of the French Revolution," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 2(2), pages 179-179.
    39. Touria Jaaidane & Olivier Musy & Ronan Tallec, 2023. "Rent-seeking, reform, and conflict: French parliaments at the end of the Old Regime," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 194(3), pages 249-275, March.
    40. Engsted, Tom, 1996. "The monetary model of the exchange rate under hyperinflation: New encouraging evidence," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 51(1), pages 37-44, April.
    41. Michener, Ron, 2015. "Redemption theories and the value of American colonial paper money," Financial History Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 22(3), pages 315-335, December.
    42. Jan Ditzen & Yiannis Karavias & Joakim Westerlund, 2021. "Testing and Estimating Structural Breaks in Time Series and Panel Data in Stata," Papers 2110.14550, arXiv.org, revised Oct 2021.
    43. Arrau, Patricio & De Gregorio, Jose, 1993. "Financial Innovation and Money Demand: Application to Chile and Mexico," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 75(3), pages 524-530, August.
    44. White, Eugene Nelson, 1995. "The French Revolution and the Politics of Government Finance, 1770–1815," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 55(2), pages 227-255, June.
    45. Grubb, Farley, 2016. "Colonial New Jersey Paper Money, 1709–1775: Value Decomposition and Performance," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 76(04), pages 1216-1232, December.
    46. Louis Rouanet, 2021. "The interest group origins of the Bank of France," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 186(1), pages 119-140, January.
    47. Michael, P & Nobay, A R & Peel, D A, 1994. "The German Hyperinflation and the Demand for Money Revisited," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 35(1), pages 1-22, February.
    48. Michener, Ron, 1988. "Backing Theories and the Currencies of Eighteenth-Century America: A Comment," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 48(03), pages 682-692, September.
    49. Cutsinger, Bryan P. & Ingber, Joshua S., 2019. "Seigniorage in the Civil War South," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 74-92.
    50. Jushan Bai & Pierre Perron, 2003. "Computation and analysis of multiple structural change models," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 18(1), pages 1-22.
    51. Marc D. Weidenmier, 2002. "Turning Points in the U.S. Civil War: Views from the Grayback Market," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 68(4), pages 875-890, April.
    52. Michener, Ronald, 1987. "Fixed exchange rates and the quantity theory in colonial America," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 233-307, January.
    53. Cukierman, Alex & Edwards, Sebastian & Tabellini, Guido, 1992. "Seigniorage and Political Instability," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 82(3), pages 537-555, June.
    54. Stock, James H, 1987. "Asymptotic Properties of Least Squares Estimators of Cointegrating Vectors," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 55(5), pages 1035-1056, September.
    55. Marc D. Weidenmier, 2002. "Turning Points in the U.S. Civil War: Views from the Grayback Market," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 68(4), pages 875-890, April.
    56. Laidler, David, 1987. "Wicksell and fisher on the "Backing" of money and the quantity theory A comment on the debate between Bruce Smith and Ronald Michener," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 325-334, January.
    57. Thanh Cong Nguyen & Vítor Castro & Justine Wood, 2022. "Political economy of financial crisis duration," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 192(3), pages 309-330, September.
    58. Engsted, Tom, 1998. "Money Demand During Hyperinflation: Cointegration, Rational Expectations, and the Importance of Money Demand Shocks," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 20(3), pages 533-552, July.
    59. Frenkel, Jacob A. & Taylor, Mark P., 1993. "Money demand and inflation in Yugoslavia 1980-1989," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 15(3), pages 455-481.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Miller, Stephen Matteo & Ndhlela, Thandinkosi, 2020. "Money demand and seignorage maximization before the end of the Zimbabwean dollar," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).
    2. Michael Sproul, 1998. "The Quantity Theory versus the Real Bills Doctrine in Colonial America," UCLA Economics Working Papers 775B, UCLA Department of Economics.
    3. P.Antipa, 2014. "How Fiscal Policy Affects the Price Level: Britain’s First Experience with Paper Money," Working papers 525, Banque de France.
    4. Bryan P Cutsinger & Vincent Geloso & Mathieu Bédard, 2022. "The wild card: colonial paper money in French North America, 1685 to 1719 [Economic Structure and Agricultural Productivity in Europe, 1300–1800]," European Review of Economic History, European Historical Economics Society, vol. 26(2), pages 185-207.
    5. Farley Grubb, 2003. "Two Theories of Money Reconciled: The Colonial Puzzle Revisited with New Evidence," Working Papers 03-03, University of Delaware, Department of Economics.
    6. Mladenovic, Zorica & Petrovic, Pavle, 2010. "Cagan's paradox and money demand in hyperinflation: Revisited at daily frequency," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 29(7), pages 1369-1384, November.
    7. Farley Grubb, 2012. "Chronic Specie Scarcity and Efficient Barter: The Problem of Maintaining an Outside Money Supply in British Colonial America ," Working Papers 12-08, University of Delaware, Department of Economics.
    8. Antipa, P., 2013. "Fiscal Sustainability and the Value of Money: Lessons from the British Paper Pound, 1797-1821," Working papers 466, Banque de France.
    9. Kim Oosterlinck & Loredana Ureche-Rangau & Jacques-Marie Vaslin, 2013. "Waterloo: a Godsend for French Public Finances?," Working Papers 0041, European Historical Economics Society (EHES).
    10. Farley Grubb, 2016. "Is Paper Money Just Paper Money? Experimentation and Variation in the Paper Monies Issued by the American Colonies from 1690 to 1775," Research in Economic History, in: Research in Economic History, volume 32, pages 147-224, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    11. Grubb, Farley, 2004. "The circulating medium of exchange in colonial Pennsylvania, 1729-1775: new estimates of monetary composition, performance, and economic growth," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 41(4), pages 329-360, October.
    12. Peter L. Rousseau, 2010. "Monetary Policy and the Dollar," NBER Chapters, in: Founding Choices: American Economic Policy in the 1790s, pages 121-149, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Leeper, E.M. & Leith, C., 2016. "Understanding Inflation as a Joint Monetary–Fiscal Phenomenon," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & Harald Uhlig (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 2305-2415, Elsevier.
    14. Michael Sproul, 1998. "Backed Money, Fiat Money, and the Real Bills Doctrine," UCLA Economics Working Papers 774B, UCLA Department of Economics.
    15. Atanas Christev, 2005. "The Hyperinflation Model of Money Demand (or Cagan Revisited): Some New Empirical Evidence from the 1990s," CERT Discussion Papers 0507, Centre for Economic Reform and Transformation, Heriot Watt University.
    16. Ronald W. Michener, 2019. "Re-examination of the Empirical Evidence Concerning Colonial New Jersey's Paper Money, 1709–1775: A Comment on Farley Grubb," Econ Journal Watch, Econ Journal Watch, vol. 16(2), pages 180–217-1, September.
    17. Karsten Schweikert, 2022. "Oracle Efficient Estimation of Structural Breaks in Cointegrating Regressions," Journal of Time Series Analysis, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 43(1), pages 83-104, January.
    18. Karsten Schweikert, 2020. "Oracle Efficient Estimation of Structural Breaks in Cointegrating Regressions," Papers 2001.07949, arXiv.org, revised Apr 2021.
    19. Loviscek, Anthony L., 1996. "Seigniorage and the Mexican financial crisis," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 36(1), pages 55-64.
    20. Patrick K. O’Brien & Nuno Palma, 2019. "Danger To The Old Lady Of Threadneedle Street? The Bank Restriction Act And The Regime Shift To Paper Money, 1797-18211," Working Papers 0082, Utrecht University, Centre for Global Economic History.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Political economy; Inflationary finance; French revolution;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • E31 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Price Level; Inflation; Deflation
    • N13 - Economic History - - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; Fluctuations - - - Europe: Pre-1913

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:eecrev:v:157:y:2023:i:c:s0014292123001393. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/eer .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.