It all gets so boring; the Jews have been blamed for centuries for
this that and the other.
No matter what some Jew may have done at some time some accusations
seem to stick. Even my wife who is totally unpolitical came up with
one that her father had said, and he has been dead for many years.
It is the one about all Jews being rich and controlling all the banks.
Well interestingly this one has some historical cause and truth to it.

In the Middle Ages and earlier all business was controlled by the
Guilds. Masons, (ha there is a twist !}, carpenters, Weavers, builders
but there were no electricians or plumbers, but sewer diggers did exist.
Anyway in an effort to make a crust the Jews looked around and faound
a niche in finance for which there was no Guild.
So they got into that area of business and the rest is written in the
history of some of the largest banking and finance family companies.

And the Jews get blamed for that !
What were the Guilds ? Basically an early form of trade unions.
Jews were banned from belonging to the Guilds.
So if you hear some lefty or trade union sounding off about the banks
then understand they are following a long tradition.

There are probably similar stories around other Jew accusations !

I got ChatGPT to give me a more comprehensive version of this story. Given heightened feelings at the moment I think it is worth being very accurate on issues to do with Jews.

For much of the Middle Ages, Christian doctrine treated charging interest to fellow Christians as usury and therefore sinful. While the rule was often bent in practice, it was strong enough to make open moneylending socially and legally difficult for Christians. Yet rulers, merchants, and cities still needed credit. Jews, who lay outside Church law, were permitted to lend at interest and thus filled a role others officially could not.

At the same time, Jews faced widespread legal and social exclusion. In many European societies they were barred from owning land, joining craft guilds, holding public office, or entering universities and professions. These restrictions sharply limited economic options. Portable, contract-based work that relied on literacy and numeracy—such as money changing, tax farming, trade finance, and later banking—became one of the few viable niches available.

Rulers also found Jewish financiers politically convenient. They could tax them heavily, rely on their skills, and, when debts or public resentment mounted, expel them or confiscate their assets. This happened repeatedly across Europe. The result was a perverse dynamic: Jews were made highly visible as lenders, while the benefits of credit to states and elites remained largely invisible.

Cultural factors reinforced this role. Jewish communities placed strong emphasis on literacy, numeracy, and legal reasoning through religious study, and diaspora networks facilitated long-distance trust and finance. These were survival adaptations rather than strategies of dominance.

By the modern era, a small number of highly visible Jewish banking families created the impression of disproportionate influence. That impression hardened into myth. In reality, Jews never controlled finance and today are no more over-represented in banking than in other education-intensive professions.

The enduring stereotype reflects a historical irony: Jews were pushed into a narrow economic role by exclusion, resented for occupying it, and later blamed for a system they neither designed nor controlled.

"Well interestingly this one has some historical cause and truth to it."

Like when Jesus upended the tables of the money changers 2000 years ago and called out their exchange-rate hustle.