Short History of Economics
Created | Updated Jun 15, 2002
In the beginning there were cavemen. They had ecnomics, but we don't really care all that much, so why don't we move on?
Next (after a short stretch, anyway) came Greece. They were a democracy, and that was all well and good, but their economy stank. They were a group of "city-states" which is to say the mountains were so bloody mountainous you couldn't travel that great a cities ruled themselves. They also fought themselves, but we didn't care that much then, so why now?
Next came Rome. Rome was great, we are all told, because it lasted a while, conquered the world as they knew it and gave us Latin. As far as I care, the person who invented Latin couldn't walk, because if he could he would've taken a brisk walk round the block, picked up a news-stylus on the way and decided the world was better off without the E Pluribus stuff, anyway. Rome had no great economic thing, they just conquered and owned everything and never had to deal with much. They are, however, the first to tax the public. I, for one, sometimes want to travel through time and whack them one upside the head.
After another bit no one cares about, manorialism happened. This is also called fuedalism. This is where one rich guy (a Duke, say, or a knight) ruled a bunch of land because the King at the time liked them. They controlled a bunch of peasants who farmed the land and got to live there in a hut. These are the first landlords. A problem with this is no one got to keep the land, so no one cared about it. After a stretch, the King decided to give away some land. This is what started mercantilism.
Under mecantilism, a bunch of people with ships had a whole heck of a lot of power. They sailed around and a: conquered things and b: traded other things. This worked really well until the American Revolution and everything stopped being quite as protectable and things began breaking up. This started Capitalism, somehow (don't ask how, I'm not quite clear on that point).
In capitalism, everyone lets the markets pretty much do its own thing. But in the late 1800's to early 1900's something called the Industrial Revolution messed everything all up. People started dying and living poorly and a couple people said "wouldn't it be nice if everyone could live on the same level?" One of these was Karl Marx. So they went and created Socialism, and Lenin turned it into Communism when he violently overthrew a government in Russia.
And that's where the world is today. Some communism, some capitalism, some socialism and a whole lot of mixed economies.
Next (after a short stretch, anyway) came Greece. They were a democracy, and that was all well and good, but their economy stank. They were a group of "city-states" which is to say the mountains were so bloody mountainous you couldn't travel that great a cities ruled themselves. They also fought themselves, but we didn't care that much then, so why now?
Next came Rome. Rome was great, we are all told, because it lasted a while, conquered the world as they knew it and gave us Latin. As far as I care, the person who invented Latin couldn't walk, because if he could he would've taken a brisk walk round the block, picked up a news-stylus on the way and decided the world was better off without the E Pluribus stuff, anyway. Rome had no great economic thing, they just conquered and owned everything and never had to deal with much. They are, however, the first to tax the public. I, for one, sometimes want to travel through time and whack them one upside the head.
After another bit no one cares about, manorialism happened. This is also called fuedalism. This is where one rich guy (a Duke, say, or a knight) ruled a bunch of land because the King at the time liked them. They controlled a bunch of peasants who farmed the land and got to live there in a hut. These are the first landlords. A problem with this is no one got to keep the land, so no one cared about it. After a stretch, the King decided to give away some land. This is what started mercantilism.
Under mecantilism, a bunch of people with ships had a whole heck of a lot of power. They sailed around and a: conquered things and b: traded other things. This worked really well until the American Revolution and everything stopped being quite as protectable and things began breaking up. This started Capitalism, somehow (don't ask how, I'm not quite clear on that point).
In capitalism, everyone lets the markets pretty much do its own thing. But in the late 1800's to early 1900's something called the Industrial Revolution messed everything all up. People started dying and living poorly and a couple people said "wouldn't it be nice if everyone could live on the same level?" One of these was Karl Marx. So they went and created Socialism, and Lenin turned it into Communism when he violently overthrew a government in Russia.
And that's where the world is today. Some communism, some capitalism, some socialism and a whole lot of mixed economies.
