All articles
Everything on Measure & Means, organised by topic.
Alternative Systems
- Barter vs. Money: What Changes in the Exchange — Barter directly exchanges goods or services without money as the payment medium; money separates selling from buying across counterparties and time.
- Complementary Currency vs. Legal Tender — Complementary currency describes an instrument intended to operate alongside dominant currency through voluntary network acceptance.
- Backing and Redemption in Currency Schemes — Backing describes assets, guarantees, member obligations, or arrangements supporting an issuer's promise.
- Local Currency Explained: Scope and Limits — A local currency is an exchange instrument for a limited place or participant network alongside national money.
- Mutual Credit Explained with a Simple Ledger — Mutual credit records a purchase by reducing the buyer's balance and increasing the seller's by the same amount.
- Recordkeeping for Barter and Noncash Exchange — Record a noncash exchange with parties, dates, goods or services, scope, supportable national-currency value, valuation method, units, taxes, fees,…
Money Basics
- Exchange Rates: Quotes, Spreads, and Movement — An exchange rate is the price of one currency in another. Confirm the pair direction and distinguish midpoint, bid, ask, cash, card, transfer, and…
- Fiat Money Explained Without the Myths — Fiat money is official money that is not convertible by right into a fixed commodity amount.
- How Bank Lending Creates Deposit Money — A commercial bank creates deposit money when it records a loan asset and a matching deposit liability.
- Inflation and Purchasing Power: The Basics — Inflation measures change in a specified broad price index over a defined period; purchasing power describes what a monetary amount can buy.
- What Legal Tender Actually Means — Legal tender is a status created by law for specified instruments and purposes in a jurisdiction, often affecting how an existing debt may be discharged.
- M1, M2, and M3: Monetary Aggregates Explained — M1, M2, and M3 are official statistical aggregates grouping selected monetary instruments from narrower to broader measures.
- Money vs. Currency: A Practical Distinction — Money is the broader system of instruments and balances used for payment, pricing, and storing purchasing ability.
- Payment, Clearing, and Settlement Explained — A payment begins when the payer authorizes value to move. Clearing validates and communicates data and may calculate obligations; settlement transfers the…
- What Is Money? Three Functions Explained — Money commonly serves as a medium of exchange, unit of account, and store of value, although no instrument performs every function perfectly.