The financial culture of the Habsburg Monarchy at the end of the 19th century

In 1881 the German-Austrian statistician and economist Karl Theodor von Inama-Sternegg2 wrote that the specific imprint of the modern economy was due, beside steam power, to the loan system: Never before have loans codetermined all conditions of trade and production, never have they had so many and such refined forms, never has their use been so widespread and so regulated, never were such large sectors of the population so fully under their spell.3