Money
- The standard currency was the livre.
- It was printed as paper money at this time.
- A farm labourer would earn 1 livre for 1-2 days work.
- 1 livre = 3 pounds of butter, 2 geese or a bushel of rye.
- Rent for an average farm was 500 livre per year.
Tax System
- Chaotic and inefficient.
- Main tax, called the taille, fell mostly on the third estate.
- Peasants in particular were burdened.
- Indirect taxes targeted food, salt and even goods entering a town.
- Taxes were collected by tax farming which reduced the tax take.
- This caused resentment and deficit.
- So, King Louis XVI borrowed more money.
The Enlightenment
- Intellectual movement of writers and thinkers.
- Challenged ideas about religion, nature and absolute monarchy.
- Voltaire, Rousseau and Montesquieu led the way in France
- They targeted church and despotic govt
- The church was seen as wealthy, corrupt and intolerant.
- The King was challenged as God’s servant.
- These ideas appealed to revolutionaries.
Growing Resentment
- Between tithes, feudal dues, taxes and corrupt laws/judges anger grew.
- Taxes were raised between 1749 and 1783 to pay for France’s wars. Church tithes alone took between 5-10% of peasants’ income.
- Rents, however, increased as the population grew and demand for farms grew – Popn: (1705 - 22.4m) to (1790 - 27.9m).
- Urban workers’ prices rose by 65% (1726-1789) but wages only went up by 22%.
Money Problems
- Louis XVI ran huge deficits
- This accounted for 20% deficit.
- In 43 yrs, war had cost 1066 million livres.
- Tax had reduced, and the privileged classes were unwilling to change.
- Louis XVI had his officials attempt reforms of the tax system, including tax on all land, whether the owners were from any estate.
- These failed and as high class revolt spread, Louis XVI called a meeting of the Estates General
- It contained 939 representatives of the church, nobility and third estate.
- Considered unreliable it had last met in 1614.
- With financial crisis, Louis XVI had ended payments from the royal treasury in Aug 1788
Economy in Crisis
- In the 1700s, good harvests had helped population growth and prosperity.
- Bad harvests were a major event in 1788 as a result of a wet spring and freak hailstorms.
- This led to unemployment.
- Food price rises led to less demand for manufactured goods at a time when workers and farmers needed income.
- The percentage of a labourer’s daily wage to pay for bread increased from 50% to 88%.
- Textile industry output halved
- Tithe owners and landowners were blamed for hoarding grain and causing price rises.
- Food riots occurred
