Silver Trade Dbq
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Although in the long run the silver trade had positive effects on the economies of China, Spain and Britain, the road up to it was not a straight shot. Despite the seemingly similar perception of the economic effects of the silver trade in the three different regions, the social implications and effects are more dependent on the point of view of the source. With this being said, the economic implications differed by class within the regions.
Both documents 4 and 5 show the desire of silver as the means of pay even though they are written from the different points of view (British and Ming respectively). This shows that the economic effects of silver were relatively standardized throughout the different regions. This is also shown in document 3 in which Wang Xijue explains how the government required all taxes to be payed in silver (Ming Dynasty). Also, in document 2, Tomas de Mercado speaks to the way that silver “flowed out” to pay for all of the incoming goods once again highlighting the systematic way in which the economic impacts of silver were viewed. On this note, the implications of silver on a socioeconomic level differed by class in that the higher classes saw the use and implementation of silver into society as a very positive thing whereas the lower classes viewed as a hinderance to some extent.
In document 3, Wang Xijue talks about how the elders informed him that the reason grain was so cheap, despite poor harvests, was that there was a lack of silver coin. He goes on to say that because the government was collecting a lot of silver, which was having a positive impact on them, but not returning a lot of silver into the economy through expenditures, the farmers received a lower return on their labor and so less land was being cultivated, which was not beneficial to the working class. Also the directly negative and exploitative effects the silver trade had on the lower classes is described in document 6. This document explains how the working class was responsible for the harvest of the silver from the mines and how more than “3,000 Indians” worked in the mines to retrieve the silver. With this being said, document 2 suggests that the investment of this silver was done by those of higher classes as the goods bought by the silver that was harvested were “Asian commodities” that were typically though of to be items of luxury. Both of these documents give way to the idea of the workers being exploited and the upper classes benefitting from this exploitation.
Although the documents make reference to the negative effects that the silver trade had on the lower