Weimar- crisis of 1923- BBC.co.uk

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http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/history/mwh/germany/crisis1923rev_print.shtml

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To put the severity of the hyperinflation that existed in Germany around 1923, this article used a few examples of just how bad the situation was.  The hyperinflation directly resulted from the frivolous printing of money, while its value began to drop.  The following is a list of a few of the outcomes that directly resulted from this:

• People collected their wages in suitcases
• One person, who left their suitcase unattended, found that a thief had stolen the suitcase but not the money (likely because the suitcase was worth much more than the money itself)
• One boy, who was sent to buy two bread buns, stopped to play football and by the time he got to the shop, the price had gone up, so he could only afford to buy one
• One father set out for Berlin to buy a pair of shoes. When he got there, he could only afford a cup of coffee and the bus fare home
• Many people affected by the hyperinflation, found it more efficient to burn the money for heat in their fireplaces rather than buying the wood to place into them, just because of the pure lack of value on the money

All of these examples, along with others that hindered any progress of the people in Germany around this time, show how severe hyperinflation.  While not very common, hyperinflation is still a very important economic topic that should not be ignored.  The more that people can learn from its effects throughout history, the less likely it is to happen in the future.

Commanding Heights: The German Hyperinflation, 1923- PBS.org

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http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/commandingheights/shared/minitext/ess_germanhyperinflation.html

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This article looks back at the epidemic of hyperinflation and its impacts on Germany in the early twentieth century.  After World War I, Germany had been defeated, and as a result, its country's economy was left in shambles.  The value of the German mark, as it does in other places victimized by hyperinflation, had dropped to next to nothing.  To put this into perspective, before this situation, the German, French, and British monetary units all had a similar exchange rate, which was at about four or five units to one U.S. dollar.  After the war, one U.S. dollar was approximately equivalent to one trillion German marks.  As stated in the article, a wheelbarrow full of money could not even buy a newspaper, let alone any vital goods needed in everyday life.  Eventually, the onset of this serious situation, along with an unstable government, and a defeated country as a whole, would become one of the factors that resulted in Hitler's rise to power, and the rest is history.

While this was one of the more dramatic examples of hyperinflation throughout history, it remains one of the best examples of the topic.  When a country faces these severe situations, there must be quick reactions by the central government to help lessen the damages.  Unfortunately, in most cases, a failing government is one of the leading causes of hyperinflation, which would render the struggling country useless to help itself out of such a severe recession.  This example should be taken very seriously, and should be a model for future struggles which can hopefully be avoided.