ABSTRACT
Our post-war experience is so varied that it is difficult to generalize from it. It seems that the present-day exchanges tend to move about a new par called "Purchasing Power Parity." Purchasing power parity gives the exchange value of one currency in terms of another by means of an equation based on the prices obtaining in the two countries in question for certain kinds of goods. Mint Par was a comparison of quantities of gold; purchasing power parity is a comparison of certain kinds of commodity prices. Purchasing power parity, unlike mint par, is a variable figure: it varies with price levels. Before the war, price levels were limited in their movements by the same factor which limited the movements of exchange rates: the possibility of shipping gold.
