Inflation

Inflation is the loss in purchasing power of a currency unit such as the dollar, usually expressed as a general rise in the prices of goods and services. A classic example is the Great Inflation of the Roman Empire. Successive emperors replaced a steadily increasing fraction of the silver in their ancient currency, the denarius, with base metals like bronze or copper. As a result prices rose inexorably despite repeated attempts to restrain them through legislation. Diocletian, rather than taking responsibility for the debasement, attributed the rapid inflation of his day to the avarice of his subjects. His famous edict of a.d. 301 threatened with death any vendor who charged prices exceeding official limits. But inflation ran along unhindered for another century until an alternative currency, an undepreciated gold coin known to Shakespeare as the bezant, became the customary unit of account, spreading throughout Europe and lasting well into the Middle Ages..