960 FINANCIAL REFORM AND THE ECONOMY
it. The people living in a lesser age of decline, that is, any dynasty after the fall
of the Chou, in Korea as well as China, would certainly be suspicious of it. YOngjo
then said that a lot more study of the problem was needed before he could reach
a decision because he had learned that it would be unwise to leap at the first
suggestion for any change without insisting that every official be allowed to
express his views and commoners be given the opportunity to oppose any pol-
icy initiative.
Yi Chong song added that multiple-denomination cash might increase the profit
from seigniorage, but those profits would prove so attractive to counterfeiters
that the government would be helpless to prevent them from flooding the mar-
ket with coins. Yi Ilche expected that the rich would be attracted to the multi-
ple-denomination coins and accumulate huge savings in them, increasing their
own wealth and their own power over the market to a degree that would surpass
the state's. He did not realize that the rich would be no less cautious than ordi-
nary people about the value of these coins and would hardly dare to tie up their
savings in rapidly depreciating currency. He compared the evil consequences
of multiple-denomination cash to the overthrow of the great well-field system
of the late Chou dynasty because after it had been destroyed by the state of Ch' in,
private property in land was created. Once the landlords had become land rich,
they were able to accumulate savings in cash as well, and it was impossible for
the state to stop them from doing so. In other words, introducing multiple-denom-
ination coins would be an epochal reform that would transform the Korean econ-
omy from stable and conservative agricultural production to a more volatile and
instable cash economy that would allow the amassing of great wealth by coun-
terfeiting and monetary manipulation. In those circumstances the Korean state
would find it as difficult to prohibit counterfeiting as to prevent the monopo-
lization of land by rich landlords after the fall of the Chou dynasty.
Yi Ilche was convinced that minting multiple-denomination cash would be of
some utility, but only for about a decade because it would drive small coins out
of the market, leave the common peasants without a medium of exchange for
small transactions, and allow the rich to control all multiple-denomination cash.
Second Minister of War Cho Wonmyong remarked that multiple-denomination
cash had been adopted in Chinese history mainly as a means for enriching the
state, but the policy did not last long, and soon after it had to be replaced by
cash of small denomination, a process that also resulted in a large financial loss
for the state as well. In other words, conservatives like Yi I1che and Cho
Wonmyong confirmed Yu Hyongwon's fears about the dangers of multiple-
denomination cash.
Song Inmyong, by contrast, expressed some limited approval for multiple-
denomination cash. He did not care that much for cash in the first place, but he
was willing to approve its adoption on an experimental basis because the king
had the option to abolish its use if it did not work out. For that matter, since
small coins were not that useful either, the king would be better off abolishing
them as well. When Yongjo asked him what would be used to replace cash, he