Economic experts at the two conferences defi ned infl ation as an “artifi cial and unrestrained expansion of the currency” that had the eff ect of reducing the currency’s purchasing power per unit. Infl ation “debased the currency,” and its degeneration could be monstrous: to buy the same goods at higher prices, one needed additional currency, which was procured by further “infl ation,” thereby creating a “vicious spiral” of “constantly rising prices and wages, and constantly increasing infl ation” (Recommendations of the Conference, Brussels 1920, vol. 1, 9).

Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, loc. 754