Book 4: Chapter 14
I took out a silver coin and gave it to the seller. He fumbled around and then gave me a few copper coins change. I frowned. It was evidently not right. This is about two copper coins more expensive than in the past. I looked at the sign which had the same price written on it and asked: “Has the cost of candy gone up?”
“No, it’s still the same price.”
“Why did I get less change then?”
“That’s because the value of copper coins has risen. You can exchange twelve copper coins for one silver coin now.”
The businessman looked at me, sighed and added, “Far out. I’ve done business for so many years and this is the first time I’ve seen the value of copper coins rise.”
I nodded and looked at the copper coins in my hand. Honestly speaking, I never thought the exchange rate would cause the value of my money to depreciate. Normally, the value of copper coins won’t appreciate because they’re circulated in the lower-class society, while silver and gold may change due to the influence of the government. However, no nation would take back copper coins and redistribute them. Usually, once they’re released into the hands of the people and circulated, copper coins would be the most stable coin for the most part. As such, its value rarely changes.
So why would the value of copper coins appreciate? The simplest explanation would be that the number of copper coins in circulation has decreased. The value of copper coins has appreciated because the number of copper coins in circulation has decreased. Since the lower-class doesn’t possess as many copper coins as before, the exchange merchants would be hard-pressed to exchange them for silver coins, thereby naturally raising the value of copper coins.
Copper isn’t a valuable metal. Plus, it would be pointless to add a valuable metal to copper. So there’s only one possible reason as to why the value of copper coins has risen, and that is because somebody is collecting them.
The country wouldn’t touch copper coins even if they had some sort of war right now because bullets made from copper have yet to exist in this era. Electric circuits have yet to come into existence. There should still be an abundance of copper mines so the empire absolutely won’t do anything to copper coins.