Editing Guild (section)

=== Economic consequences ===
The economic consequences of guilds have led to heated debates among economic historians. On the one side, scholars say that since merchant guilds persisted over long periods they must have been efficient institutions (since inefficient institutions die out). Others say they persisted not because they benefited the entire economy but because they benefited the owners, who used political power to protect them. Ogilvie (2011) says they regulated trade for their own benefit, were monopolies, distorted markets, fixed prices, and restricted entrance into the guild.<ref name=Ogilvie11/> Ogilvie (2008) argues that their long apprenticeships were unnecessary to acquire skills, and their conservatism reduced the rate of innovation and made the society poorer. She says their main goal was [[rent seeking]], that is, to shift money to the membership at the expense of the entire economy.<ref>{{cite journal |first=Sheilagh C. |last=Ogilvie |title=Rehabilitating the Guilds: A Reply |journal=Economic History Review |volume=61 |issue=1 |pages=175–182 |date=February 2008 |doi=10.1111/j.1468-0289.2007.00417.x |s2cid=154741942 }}</ref>

Epstein and Prak's book (2008) rejects Ogilvie's conclusions.<ref>{{harvnb|Epstein|Prak|2008}}</ref> Specifically, Epstein argues that guilds were cost-sharing rather than rent-seeking institutions. They located and matched masters and likely apprentices through monitored learning. Whereas the acquisition of craft skills required experience-based learning, he argues that this process necessitated many years in apprenticeship.<ref>{{cite journal |first=Stephan R. |last=Epstein |title=Craft Guilds, Apprenticeship, and Technological Change in Preindustrial Europe |journal=Journal of Economic History |volume=58 |issue= 3|pages=684–713 |date=September 1998 |doi=10.1017/S0022050700021124 |s2cid=154609939 }}</ref>

The extent to which guilds were able to monopolize markets is also debated.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Richardson G. |title=A Tale of Two Theories: Monopolies and Craft Guilds in Medieval England and Modern Imagination |journal=Journal of the History of Economic Thought |volume=23 |issue=2 |pages=217–242 |date=June 2001 |doi=10.1080/10427710120049237 |s2cid=13298305 }}</ref>

====Product quality====
Guilds were often heavily concerned with product quality. The regulations they established on their own members' work, as well as targeting non-guild members for illicit practice, was to create a standard of work that the consumer could rely on. They were heavily concerned with public perception. In October 1712, the Lyon Wigmaker Guild petitioned the local police magistrates. According to this petition, guildmasters required guild officers to step up policing of statutes forbidding the use of bleached hair or wild goat and lamb hair. The real concern that they had was that bleaching hair destroyed the quality of the wig, making it too thin to style. Guild officers pointed out that if the consumer discovers the bad quality, the guild would be blamed, and the consumer would search elsewhere to purchase goods.<ref name="gayne" />