TIL many US companies in the late 1800s-1938 would pay their employees in company scrip, a currency issued by the employer and can only be used in company owned stores where they upcharged exorbita...
I was born one mornin' when the sun didn't shine
I picked up my shovel and I walked to the mine
I loaded 16 tons of number nine coal
And the straw boss said, "Well, a-bless my soul"
You load 16 tons, what do you get?
Another day older and deeper in debt
St. Peter, don't you call me 'cause I can't go
I owe my soul to the company store.
I used to think my daddy was a black man
With script enough to buy the company store
Now he goes to town with empty pockets
And his face is white as February snow
If you learned that today, you must have been living under a very cosy rock of blissful ignorance.
This scheme is still in use even now in a wide array of poorer countries.
Oh it's even better. Look up the battle of Blair Mountain. Where the US government dropped bombs on protesting coal miners, whose only crime was wanting to be paid in real currency.