Introduction

History of Money, Banks, and Saving

How old is the concept of saving?

The concept of saving may go back as far as the Neolithic Period (around 10,000 B.C.E.) when early man began settling in villages and engaged in agricultural production and animal husbandry. The very fact that they were producing more food than each farm could consume means that they had to save and, later, trade the surplus.

One of America’s Founding Fathers, Benjamin Franklin published many wise sayings in his Poor Richard’s Almanack, but is misquoted in the saying “A penny saved is a penny earned.’