"Stronger" is tricky to measure. "Efficient" is bit better to measure. The introduction of standardized (and "policed") coins certainly opened up commerce a few thousand years back, but in the end it did not stop the Romans from taking over the Greek world, for example.
There is a lot more to societies than money. Can you do huge damage to societies from hyperinflation - for sure, but outside of catastrophic failures of money, not so sure there is a strong link.
> The introduction of standardized (and "policed") coins certainly opened up commerce a few thousand years back, but in the end it did not stop the Romans from taking over the Greek world, for example.
Yes I'm assuming all else equal or when studied over a long period of time. Nowadays we can use our knowledge and intelligence to simply start using better money in advance.
> Can you do huge damage to societies from hyperinflation - for sure, but outside of catastrophic failures of money, not so sure there is a strong link.
I don't think you appreciate the damage that has already been caused by fiat. Look at USA, the UK and compare them to just 50 years ago.
We think we are rich but it's just an illusion caused by devalued money. An average man used to be able to own a home, and support a wife and kids on his salary. Those days are long gone. The bankers are unjustly getting more and more powerful (far more powerful than the governments) while the people are becoming weaker and weaker.
People are using it in advance, for example, by holding equity and other assets. Those who just want to store value in money haven't quite understood an economic system that isn't design to store but rather to produce.
I struggle to see shifts in earning power as a fiat issue. Why isn't it weaker unions in the US or UK, for example? Why not (de-)regulation or any other long list of things. The shifts in power are not a result of fiat or devaluation (why were only a few powerful in times with very hard money?). You can have places where less GDP is in the financial sector and still lower earnings cohorts had a miserable history (or even the median earner). Germany has a rather smaller banking sector than the US, but real earnings over that last 25 years have only moved a little (so has productivity).
The hope that somehow by changing the money a complex set of problems goes away is in error, I believe, and not helpful in addressing those issues. (You can also look at monetary reforms and see that those didn't magically solve all problems.)
The underlying cause is the illusion created by fiat. It's a trick.
People have been unknowingly getting pay cuts each year for the last 50+ years. They are unaware because they receive more currency units each year and are still able to afford the same everyday consumables.
They don't realise that the consumables have been getting cheaper and cheaper over the decades (through efficiencies of production) because currency devaluation causes prices to actually go up.
It's only when they try to buy hard assets like real estate that have retained their value and find them impossibly expensive, without understanding why.
Then you've got all the devalued pensions and savings, and other stealth wealth transfer through "capital gains" tax (the more the bankers print themselves money to lend out, the capital gains tax we have to pay) and income tax bands that don't track nominal wage increases etc.
GDP appears to increase, but it's just an illusion caused by the devaluation of the units it's measured in. In the US it has been going down for decades.
It is a slow transfer of wealth from the population to the bankers. People work harder, but find themselves increasingly struggling to survive. They become unmotivated and ultimately when the deterioration in living standards becomes too much, revolt.
And that's only within the country that's printing the money. For other countries using that currency, the effect is even worse as the entire country is stealthily looted.
All the time, the bankers are acquiring all this wealth and are becoming richer and more powerful than many people could imagine. Able to control governments and mass media alike.
A few people, most not. The vast, vast majority people think real estate in the US has gone up in value over the last 50 years.
Well the banks are collecting interest on every single dollar in existence. All created by them out of thin air. Currently that's in the region of $80T and it's been going in for decades, centuries even.
As far as house price inflation is concerned, depending on what your basket is, prices increased quite a bit more than the CPI basket (so up in value), if you hold the S&P next to it, not do much difference.
There is a lot more to societies than money. Can you do huge damage to societies from hyperinflation - for sure, but outside of catastrophic failures of money, not so sure there is a strong link.