Well, if you're talking about the 1920s:
In economics, hyperinflation is inflation that is "out of control," a condition in which prices increase rapidly as a currency loses its value. No precise definition of hyperinflation is universally accepted. One simple definition requires a monthly inflation rate of 20 or 30% or more. In informal usage the term is often applied to much lower rates.
The definition used by most economists is "an inflationary cycle without any tendency toward equilibrium." A vicious circle is created in which more and more inflation is created with each iteration of the cycle. Although there is a great deal of debate about the root causes of hyperinflation, it becomes visible when there is an unchecked increase in the money supply or drastic debasement of coinage, and is often associated with wars (or their aftermath), economic depressions, and political or social upheavals.
The main cause of hyperinflation is a massive imbalance between the supply and demand of a certain currency or type of money, usually due to a complete loss of confidence in the currency similar to a bank run. First, the enactment of legal tender laws prevent discounting the value of paper money vis-a vis gold, silver or a hard currency, by forcing acceptance of a paper money which lacks intrinsic value. If the entity responsible for printing a currency then promotes excessive money printing, with other factors contributing a reinforcing effect, hyperinflation usually occurs. Often the body responsible for printing the currency cannot physically print paper currency faster than the rate at which it is devaluing, thus neutralising their attempts to stimulate the economy.[2]
Hyperinflation is generally associated with paper money because the means to increasing the money supply with paper money is the simplest: add more zeroes to the plates and print, or even stamp old notes with new numbers. It also is the most dramatic so far with electronic money now posing the possibility of even faster "printing" and de-regulated capital markets allowing currency to "go global". There have been numerous episodes of hyperinflation, followed by a return to "hard money". Older economies would revert to hard currency and barter when the circulating medium became excessively devalued, generally following a "run" on the store of value.
Unlike inflation, which is widely considered to be normal in a healthy economy, hyperinflation is always regarded as destructive. It effectively wipes out the purchasing power of private and public savings, distorts the economy in favor of extreme consumption and hoarding of real assets, causes the monetary base whether specie or hard currency to flee the country, and makes the afflicted area anathema to investment. Hyperinflation is met with drastic remedies, whether by imposing a shock therapy of slashing government expenditures or by altering the currency basis. An example of the latter is placing the nation in question under a currency board as Bosnia-Herzegovina had in 2005, which allows the central bank to print only as much money as it has in foreign reserves. Another example is dollarization as Ecuador officially initiated in September 2000 in response to a massive 75% loss of value of the Sucre currency in early January 2000. Dollarization is the use of a foreign currency (not necessarily the U.S. dollar) as a national unit of currency.
"The hyperinflation episode in the Weimar Republic in the 1920s was not the first hyperinflation, nor was it the only one in early 1920s Europe. However, as the most prominent case following the emergence of economics as a science, it drew interest in a way that previous instances had not. Many of the surreal economic behaviors now associated with hyperinflation were first documented systematically in Germany: order-of-magnitude increases in prices and interest rates, redenomination of the currency, consumer flight from cash to hard assets, and the rapid expansion of industries that produced those assets.
It is sometimes argued that Germany had to inflate its currency to pay the war reparations required under the Treaty of Versailles, but this is only part of the story. Reparations accounted for about one third of the German deficit from 1920 to 1923 (Costantino Bresciani-Turroni, The Economics of Inflation. London: George Allen & Unwin, 1937. p. 93). Nonetheless, the government found reparations a convenient scapegoat. Other scapegoats included bankers and speculators (particularly foreign). The inflation reached its peak by November 1923, but ended when a new currency (the Rentenmark) was introduced. The government stated this new currency had a fixed value, and this was accepted.
Hyperinflation did not directly bring about the Nazi takeover of Germany; the inflation ended with the introduction of the Rentenmark and the Weimar Republic continued for a decade afterward. The inflation did, however, raise doubts about the competence of liberal institutions, especially amongst a middle class who had held cash savings and bonds. It also produced resentment of Germany's bankers and speculators, many of them Jewish, whom the government and press blamed for the inflation.
2007-09-30 04:23:21
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answer #1
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answered by johnslat 7
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The massive inflation, or hyperinflation, that began in the Weimar Republic can be completely blamed on the treaty ending WWI. England and France heaped war reparations on Germany and held them to it and thus all of their money was going out of country and none was in country. The population was reduced to gleaning fields and eating garbage.
To make money available to the public, more and more money was created - a fact that caused the reduction of value of all of the Germany money. From the lectures of my German Professor, you would have to have a wheel barrow full of 10,000DM just to get a roll of toilet paper.
I collect stamps and have stamps that have been overprinted two times -perhaps originally 100Marks, printed over with 1000 Marks and then 10,000 marks. I also have a myriad of Weimar municipal bonds, many of which were not worth the paper they were printed on when they were sold.
You can toss out all of the prior definitions of hyperinflation that you have heard and consider this: The printing of more and more money without a gold or silver basis, devalues all of the money that is printed and drives up prices. Hyperinflation is, therefore, caused by the existence of too much coinage and paper money with no real money basis behind it.
I don't need Wikipedia to answer that question.
2007-09-30 08:18:27
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answer #2
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answered by Polyhistor 7
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Rarely in an inflation period, in any country, is it a case of someone was responsible. In our current society, we tend to blame someone for nearly anything that occurs. But in a situation like an inflationary era of time, it's a variety of circumstances that went wrong. If you are speaking of Germany's inflation period from 1918 until the 30s, then it was WW I that started the slippery slope. Germany had put all it's resources in to its war effort. When that was gone, so were the jobs. Plus Germany was ordered by the Treaty of Versailles to pay France for its cost of the war. So the German government didn't have the money to put back in to it's own society to start the programs to renew the economy. There's a lot more to this situation, but this is a general outline.
2007-09-30 04:17:44
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answer #3
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answered by Derail 7
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The WW1 German government became particularly undesirable at financing the conflict by way of taxation. jointly as the British raised taxes and presented income controls on conflict products, the German government did no longer. They was hoping that they could win the conflict and pay for it by way of reparations(as in 1871). This meant that as quickly as Germany misplaced, she became saddled with a extensive debt. the 1st few years of Weimar had comparable issues. Unwilling to advance taxes, which may be unpopular, yet desiring to fund the hot great social programmes, Weimar governments borrowed much extra. whilst the Germany government pleaded lack of ability to pay reparations in 1923, the French government, dealing with an election, invaded the Ruhr alongside with the Belgians. The Weimar government declared a coverage of passive resistance, and paid the miners to strike. The Weimar government in simple terms revealed extra money. This, coupled with an entire lack of self assurance interior the Mark, meant the linked fee of the remote places money plummeted.
2016-10-20 09:07:23
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answer #4
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answered by ? 4
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I believe it was Hitler, I think he drastically rose the taxes so that in order to buy a single loaf of bread you would have to use barrels of money.
2007-09-30 04:09:36
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answer #5
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answered by RioDragon 1
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