Gasparo Scaruffi (1519–1584), from Reggio Emilia was an Italian economist who proposed a universal currency in order to facilitate an open, objective and just economic system, which, he argued, was the essential foundation of a just society.

Through his experiences of the economic practices of different Italian duchies, and his activities assaying Italian and foreign coins, Scaruffi became convinced that the number and variation of coins in circulation, as well as arbitrary practices such as devaluation, only served to obstruct trade, and subject merchants and governors alike to excessive and unnecessary complications and negotiations.

He saw the businessman, who seeks his goals through rational means, taking objective regard of opportunities and hindrances, and indifferent to sentiment, as the model for how all transactions and social relations should occur.

However, in many other ways his picture of an economy based on transparency and fair negotiation, his more extended ideas on society and justice, and the very notion of a universal currency, were very far-seeing.

How much his ideas influenced other economists, of his own or later eras, is unclear, but in themselves his views represent a clear step forward from mercantilism towards a more modern conception of economics.