Regardless of what the sign says, there is no Free Lunch. Everything costs something, and most of the world has long adopted tokens representing value. The invention of paper money in China, saved us from lugging sacks of gold to the grocery store, and established the need for confidence in the currency's value. When merchants began using letters of credit, trade became easier. Government leaders, kings for the most part until recent times, had two great problems, and one was finances.
Kings in Europe pretty much grew out of Warlords, competing with one another. Going to War wasn't cheap, and Feudalism was the typical answer. There wasn't a large supply of currency, so Kings struck their own and economies shared coinage. The King's coin might be sought after, or not, and most were pretty crudely struck. The National Treasury could be found in a chest beneath the monarch's bed. John Lackland collected gems, and lost the lot crossing a flooded river. So when a king needed money, he could tax the People who had lots of carrots, but no coin, or he could borrow from a few sources at high interest, or strike more coins of lesser value.
By the end of the 17th century, the Credit System we are all familiar with was the wave of the future. Want to build a raail road to carry coal, but don't have the cash, borrow on credit against the potential future earnings. People began to become fabulously wealthy sitting in the Coffee-shop doing nothing, while Sila's sells his labor and straw for almost nothing. Didn't seem right then, and to many doesn't seem right today. The system initially required that governments back their currency and credit with Gold, generally. When currency isn't backed by something of "real" value, it's issue can easily lead to inflation when the supply of money is increased. The means of keeping the money supply balanced has been the "independent Central Bank" that controls interest rates to dampen economic change while maintaining an annual growth rate of generally between 2 and 5%.
Andrew Jackson's contribution to Westward Expansion is the foundation of his reputation as President. His distrust of Englishmen, Banks an Bankers led him to kill the Congressionally Chartered Bank, headed at the time by Nicolas Biddle. The result was one of the Nation's earliest depressions as banks and other organizations issued their own "paper". The situation stabilized by the Treasury Department going on the Gold Standard. That limited the amount of currency available, so a strong popular movement to back the Dollar with Silver developed in the last quarter of the century. Ah, finally the Federal Reserve Act that has been fundamental to building one of the Worlds Great Economies.
