The Continental Dollar: What Happened to It after 1779?
Abstract
Congress financed the American Revolution by issuing paper Continental Dollars. The story of the Continental Dollar is familiar to all -- a lot were issued and hyper-inflation ensued. Emissions were permanently discontinued in 1779. Thereafter, they became worthless and were forgotten. They had no impact on subsequent public finance. The veracity of the last part of this story is challenged here. Evidence is presented to establish that the disposition of the Continental Dollar remained an open question well into the 1790s. Evidence is also presented to establish the exact time path of the retirement of Continental Dollars between 1779 and 1790.Download Info
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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 13770.Length:
Date of creation: Feb 2008
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:13770
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Keywords:Other versions of this item:
- Farley Grubb, 2008. "The Continental Dollar: What Happened to It after 1779?," Working Papers 08-09, University of Delaware, Department of Economics.
- N1 - Economic History - - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; Fluctuations
- N11 - Economic History - - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; Fluctuations - - - U.S.; Canada: Pre-1913
- N2 - Economic History - - Financial Markets and Institutions
- N21 - Economic History - - Financial Markets and Institutions - - - U.S.; Canada: Pre-1913
This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:
- NEP-ALL-2008-02-09 (All new papers)
- NEP-HIS-2008-02-09 (Business, Economic & Financial History)
- NEP-MON-2008-02-09 (Monetary Economics)
References
References listed on IDEASPlease report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
- Farley Grubb, 2007.
"The Net Worth of the US Federal Government, 1784–1802,"
American Economic Review,
American Economic Association, vol. 97(2), pages 280-284, May.
- Farley Grubb, 2007. "The Net Worth of the U.S. Federal Government, 1784-1802," Working Papers 07-02, University of Delaware, Department of Economics.
- Calomiris, Charles W., 1988. "Institutional Failure, Monetary Scarcity, and the Depreciation of the Continental," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 48(01), pages 47-68, March.
- Garber, Peter M., 1991.
"Alexander Hamilton's market-based debt reduction plan,"
Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy,
Elsevier, vol. 35(1), pages 79-104, January.
- Peter M. Garber, 1991. "Alexander Hamilton's Market Based Debt Reduction Plan," NBER Working Papers 3597, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
- Grubb, Farley, 2008.
"The Continental Dollar: How Much Was Really Issued?,"
The Journal of Economic History,
Cambridge University Press, vol. 68(01), pages 283-291, March.
- Farley Grubb, 2007. "The Continental Dollar: How Much Was Really Issued?," NBER Working Papers 13047, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
- Farley Grubb, 2007. "The Continental Dollar: How Much Was Really Issued ?," Working Papers 07-09, University of Delaware, Department of Economics.
Citations
Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.Cited by:
- Farley Grubb, 2008.
"The Distribution of Congressional Spending During the American Revolution, 1775-1780: The Problem of Geographic Balance,"
Working Papers
08-21, University of Delaware, Department of Economics.
- Farley Grubb, 2008. "The Distribution of Congressional Spending During the American Revolution, 1775-1780: The Problem of Geographic Balance," NBER Working Papers 14267, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
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