Could the WW have something like a credit crunch?

[moonlite_tryst]

I'm not an economist and only have the vaguest idea about things such as GDP, inflation, deflation, customs and excise, but I do get that countries survive by trading with other countries, providing a marketable product or service, or selling a natural resource in demand by others. A ridiculously simple overview I know..

Which leads me to my questions:

How do you think the wizarding world economy works?

Do Uk wizards trade with other communities around the world and what do you think the UK wizards could offer?

Do galleons rise and fall in price like other monetary systems? Would Voldemort's actions have had a negaive impct on the WW economy?

How does Gringott's operate?

Do the goblins charge their human customers and would they have something like the Muggle money markets to make a profit on all that gold etc sitting in their vaults?

Could famillies like the Malfoys, Blacks and Potters have amassed their fortunes by taking advantage of generations of Muggle labour or Muggle ambition, such as trading in tea, porcelain, opium etc?

I'm thinking this gathering of wealth on the back of Muggle labour is very likely because there must've been Muggle borns throughout the centuries. Would the heir to a grand estate been made to renounce his title because he was a wizard?

Thoughts?

Comments

[moonlite-tryst.livejournal.com]

to keep the wizarding world somewhere around 1650 in terms of technology,

True, except, it seems, for the Howarts express. However, I'd've thought that if the muggle population increases due to improved infant mortality rates, then surely the percentage of muggle borns reaching Hogwarts would increase and with them an influx of muggle ideas to challenge the status quo of the pre-industrial WW.

bet aristocrats like the Malfoys (and probably the Potters as well) made their wealth from licenses along the lines of the East India Company.

Yes. That's the sort of thing I was implying. I'm sure they could be quite creative in muscling out the competition, especially if the competition were Muggles. That would also work for gold, silver and other mining operations.

I think that the prohibition between the Muggle and the Wizarding world was so profound

This leads me onto something else that keeps niggling at me. What about the reactions of muggle born landed gentry or royalty when the owl from Hogwarts arrives? If they didn't lock their more than strange child away, then said child may return as heir to an estate with notions of trade between the two, or is it expressly forbidden?

[pir8fancier.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately, I think that any attempts to create a rational world within the confines of her imagination is impossible. I really don't think that she cares that with wizards being born into Muggle families there would (rationally, that word again) crossover between the two societies. That wouldn't work in her visual framework for this series. Part of its charm (although it starts wearing thin by book 5, IMO) is that the wizarding world is so archaeic. At certain points it's mandatory that things BE rigid, that the world's don't meet, for the plot to move forward. The only time she let's the "real" world intrude is when it serves her purposes (with the magical car business and making fun of Arthur Weasley).

She can't even make her magic follow a certain integrity, so I think that for us to construct a complicated economic system that has an integrity is a fool's errand. Basically, if you wanted to construct a financial basis for wizarding wealth, then I would use the aristos in the 17th century as a loose model (East India Company model) and let your imagination go wild. I think some things would be a given. Malfoy's are landed wealth, but they also have strong ties to the government, so I can see them leaning on their government lackeys for the granting of lucrative trade licenses. This seems a given.

Part of the problem here is that these characters tend to act in a vaccuum. With the exception of the Weasleys, the Malfoys, and the Grangers, we have no idea what peoples' parents actually do. We have no idea what Grandparent Potters did, although we know they are Purebloods. They do not seem landed, because no land passes onto Harry, BUT they had money.

You know, I'm of the mind to just go for it and let the world be your oyster, keeping in mind that we have a few givens and are dealing with a world that had no technology.

I think an excellent role model might be the Bertram family in Austen's "Mansfield Park." The family was landed and aristocratic, but it was limited and the bulk of their wealth came from slavery. That fits with the Malfoys!