Cantillon is a fancy name for a long running swindle. In fiat currency systems, those closest to the monetary authority (i.e. cronies) get to spend the depreciating currency before everyone else, meaning that they get to spend before it depreciates. From Mark E. Jeftovic at zerohedge.com:
What we now call “The Cantillon Effect” was known far back as circa-1730, by at least one economist. It hasn’t been taken very seriously in modern times, especially here in the fiat age.
Named after its author, Richard Cantillon, in his “Essay on Economic Theory” (“Essai sur la Nature du Commerce en Général”) — it is his only surviving work and was published posthumously in 1755, more than 20 years after he was murdered by a former cook whom he had dismissed from his household. The disgruntled ex-employee, returned by night, robbed his home, then set it ablaze, with Cantillon — and the rest of his manuscripts, within.
The Essay On Economic Theory had been previously circulated in pamphlet form, which is why copies survived to be published to the world, and lays bare the dirty secret behind all fiat monetary schemes:
In a nutshell, when money is created or added to an economy, the people who receive it first, benefit, but they do so to the detriment of everybody else.
