Úsáideoir:MALA2009/Máine tiúilipe (Béarla)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Tulip mania or tulipomania (Dutch names include tulpenmanie, tulpomanie, tulpenwoede, tulpengekte, and bollengekte) was a period in the Dutch Golden Age during which contract prices for bulbs of the recently introduced tulip reached extraordinarily high levels and then suddenly collapsed.[1] At the peak of tulip mania in February 1637, tulip contracts sold for more than 10 times the annual income of a skilled craftsman. It is generally considered the first recorded speculative bubble.[2] The term "tulip mania" is often used metaphorically to refer to any large economic bubble.[3]
The event was popularized in 1841 by the book Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, written by British journalist Charles Mackay. According to Mackay, at one point 12 acres (5 ha) of land were offered for a Semper Augustus bulb.[4] Mackay claims that many such investors were ruined by the fall in prices, and Dutch commerce suffered a severe shock. Although Mackay's book is a classic that is widely reprinted today, his account is contested. Modern scholars believe that the mania was not as extraordinary as Mackay described; some suggesting that no economically meaningful bubble occurred.[5]
Research on the tulip mania is difficult because of limited data from the 1630s—much of which comes from biased, anti-speculative sources.[6][7] Rather than a speculative mania, some modern economists have proposed rational explanations for the high prices, although these explanations are not universally accepted. For example, other flowers, such as the hyacinth, also had high prices on the flower's introduction, which then fell dramatically. The high prices may also have been driven by expectations of a parliamentary decree that contracts could be voided for a small cost—thus lowering the risk to buyers.