PRESENT MONETARY PROBLEMS. 211 



Among writers as late as John Stuart Mill, there is practically 

 no separation of these functions. The term money was applied in- 

 differently to an instrument which served only as a medium of ex- 

 change, or only as a standard, as the case might be. Obviously, it 

 would not be possible here to summarize all the different ways in which 

 the functions of money have been viewed : they vary with each writer. 

 In the main, there is a discussion upon the merits of the following 

 separate functions : 



1. A medium of exchange. 



2. A standard, or measure of value. 



3. A standard of deferred payments. 



4. A legal means of payment. 



5. A store of value. 



6. A means for transferring value or capital. 



The most recent German writer, the distinguished scholar, Helf- 

 ferich, in an epoch-making treatise,* holds that there are only two 

 primary functions of money, neither being secondary to the other: 

 (1) Medium of exchange, (2) means of payment. He does not re- 

 gard the standard function as essential to the conception of money, 

 believing that any such service as may be included under a measure 

 of value has been derived from the two primary functions given above. 

 With several other writers, he finds that the medium of exchange was 

 the thing which first developed, and then came into general use as a 

 standard, or measure of value. He practically defines money as every- 

 thing serving to facilitate exchange between economic factors. Thus, 

 Helfferich would hold that the state, by giving legal tender power to 

 things worthless in themselves, such as irredeemable paper, created a 

 means of payment for debts, and therefore he would include even such 

 instruments as these under money, because they fall under one of his 

 primary divisions. 



Whatever conclusions may be reached in regard to the functions 

 of money, their application to the system of any one country would raise 

 difficult questions as to the classification of money. If one of the neces- 

 sary functions is lacking to any one form of money, is it, or is it not, 

 true money ? For instance, in the United States, no one would hesitate 

 to say that gold coin is true money, and yet it is very little used as an 

 actual medium of exchange. Therefore, we may easily call that true 

 money which does not serve principally as a medium of exchange. 

 Also, silver dollars, and French five-franc pieces, in the so-called ' limp- 

 ing gold standard,' could not be called true money in all senses, because 

 their value is dependent on a primary form of money. Like national 

 bank-notes and greenbacks, they are only ' surrogates/ they are, per- 

 haps, legal, but not economic, money in the fullest sense. 



* ' Das Geld,' von Karl Helfferich, Leipzig, 1903, 8vo, pp. x + 590. 



