Guilds Price Formation And Market Structures In Byzantium George C Maniatis by George C. Maniatis 9780754659914, 0754659917 instant download after payment.

INTRODUCTION

The mainstream view in the twentieth century has been that the Byzantine economy was centrally controlled by means of a pervasive and overwhelming guild system extending over all sectors, to the provinces, and even beyond the twelfth century. The state allegedly exercised strict oversight over all economic activities, determining the quantity and quality of inputs and outputs and fixing the price of goods and labor. Domestic and foreign trade was strictly regulated, the guild system stifled private initiative and competition as the guilds wielded unbound monopoly pricing power, and price competition all but vanished. Yet, while thete have been recurring assertions about the ostensibly invasive character of state interventions, the all-encompassing regulatory apparatus, extensive price controls, and exclusive guild import and sales monopolies, the implications of an array of policy directives and measures taken by the state to buttress the competitive process and prop up the market mechanism have never been explored. In particular, no attempt was made to fathom the conceptual basis, institutional framework, market structures, and market dynamics which shaped the process of price formation in the marketplace.