>Date: Sat, 21 Sep 1996 04:57:57 -0500 (CDT) >From: Tibor R Machan What's All the Fuss About Money? [Not to be quoted without the author's permission. This essay is exerpted from his manuscript, BUSINESS BASHING, WHY IT'S HAZARDOUS TO OUR HEALTH.] By Tibor R. Machan There is nothing new about all the badmouthing of money we witness so often in our political environment. Not only do we find many of the literati railing against money, even while some of them eagerly urge their agents to negotiate hefty deals for paperback or movie renditions of their works-e.g., John Grisham, whose The Pelican Brief is a rich bashing pulp novel if there ever was one. The right themselves are making it worse for themselves with their joining of the chorus of money bashers. Anxieties have prompted many people to seek instant scapegoats, which has often lead to intensified denunciations of greed, avarice, the "me" generation, and the attempts of a few politicians during the past decades to contain government expenditures. The rich are most to blame for it all-reminiscent of how the Nazis managed to turn so many German citizens against Jews, many of whom were closely associated with finance and banking. But in our "age of whining" one might have guessed it: the fault lies never in the souls of men and women who engage in the rash and destructive behavior. Instead the responsibility for all misfortune lies with those who want to be thrifty with taxpayers' dollars, or with their own. Even news reporters, who are supposed to be objective, refer to cost-cutting efforts by government as "Washington's cutting of benefits," as if it were a foregone conclusion that people have a basic right to be handed, with the aid of the gun, other people's money. Many of our current candidates for political office have been talking about all the horrible greed that pervaded our nation throughout its history, most recently during the Reagan-Bush administrations. Some appear to love to repeat this theme as if it were their private mantra, even while all they can promise to do to alleviate further trouble is to throw more of other people's money at bureaucrats hired to help the poor and downtrodden. They are, of course, taught this by heavy scholarly tomes, such as Daniel Bell's The Cultural Contradiction of Capitalism, which propounds the thesis that capitalism forces us all the become hedonists, people who care for nothing other than the satisfaction of their desire for pleasure. Money is at once evil and good, by these accounts. It is seen as a very useful instrument, facilitating as it does market exchange, saving, and economic communication in general yet, at once, a corroding influence because it encourages us to view everything in terms of a market price. As Marx put it, with money a society becomes a cash nexus. The thinking witnessed around us about money is, in any case, certainly quite confused. Some points, however, should help with straightening it out. First of all, it is worthwhile to recall that the famous Biblical statement often quoted about money is not actually about money but about loving it. It is said, in any case, that the love of money is the root of all evil, not money itself, nor indeed a preference or desire or even a high regard for it. Now that can be crucial-love is to be reserved for one's God, family, and friends-in short, for one's personal intimates, not for anything else. No wonder, then, that if one gets confused and actually loves money or one's collection of rare books, golf or deep sea fishing, thereby seriously mistaking one's priorities, it leads one astray and ought to be resisted. There is no serious doubt of the meaning of the focus on money, in the context of the frequent admonition that we should lead lives of greater spirituality and eschew pleasure and other materialistic pursuits. It is not the love of money but its appreciation that is lamented, so we can ask whether this makes any sense at all. In response to this it needs to be noted that there is nothing wrong with money nor with a healthy regard for its importance in one's life-any more than with a serious concerned for one's health and with seeking to gain other life enhancing accessories. Nor is there anything amiss with striving to obtain as much of it as one requires for living as well as one can. As Emerson noted, Money, which represents the prose of life, & which is hardly spoken of in parlors without an apology, is, in its effects and laws, as beautiful as roses. Property keeps the accounts of the world, and is always moral.1 Money is actually no more than a convenient commodity useful for purposes of trading other commodities and services. Money is a convenient shortcut to avoiding the very cumbersome process of barter, one that once suited small human communities but simply will not suffice in efficiency and simplicity for a large community. Money can itself be treated as a derivative kind of commodity. Because it is a thing that represents values for people, it becomes a value-somewhat like a ticket to a theater, sporting event or an airliner can. Many items of derivative value exist. In this derivative state, of course, they can gain and lose value. Take tickets to a concert or claims checks for pawned articles. Promissory notes, too, are of derivative value-no one would purchase them for the paper they are written on. But as means they are extremely useful to us. And this is indeed an excellent thing-human beings and their choices and actions can produce a great many varieties of valued items for their lives and the lives of their loved ones. Even as a commodity, the value of money derives from its utility as representation, as a means to obtaining other ends that are in fact of substantive value to persons. So what does all the hostility toward money mean, and what does it reveal? What in fact do all the cheerleaders of envy object to when they rail against money? Put bluntly, their main target is actually living well. What motivates most people's highly demeaning outlook about money is misguided guilt about their own and other people's achievement of a decent standard of living, and of some luxury and pleasure from life. These people are sincere-but, sadly, sincerely wrong. They think that no one should or has a right to be happy so long as there is poverty, disease, misery, deprivation, hunger and other regrettable human conditions in this world. They are the puritans whom H. L. Mencken defined by noting that they are afraid that somewhere, someone might be happy. Just consider the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s observations about this: As long as there is poverty in the world, I can never be rich, even if I have a billion dollars. As long as diseases are rampant and millions of people in this world cannot expect to live more than 28 or 30 years, I can never be totally healthy-even if I just got a good checkup at the Mayo Clinic. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. This is the way the world is made. Critics of money, and of those who have a respectable sum of it, tend to look at all the successful and prosperous people in the world as an affront to the less fortunate. They draw hardly a distinction between those who have met with misfortune through no fault of their own, and those who have destroyed their lives of their own accord. While it may not be simple to draw such a distinction, without it we rob ourselves of conceptual tools that are indispensable even as we evaluate the thinking of different people on various topics, including this one. Neither do they see any relevance in the fact that some of those who are wealthy have honestly earned it from serving other people who wanted them to be of service. But this is very wrong, very unjust. It also makes very little sense. What, after all, is it that the poor would like most? To have more money than they now have, to be more prosperous than they are. The unfortunate poor want to be well off and that is what is so sad about their lives. Yet they disagree vigorously about the value and merit, indeed, the moral propriety, of having money. Many both implicitly and explicitly approve of it. They would just as soon obtain it now, even before many others do, than wait until the entire world is well off. Rightly so, since one cannot in fact build utopia, although one has a decent chance at improving one's own and one's intimates' lot. Maybe many lambaste money, in part, because some of them haven't earned it. Some could be miseducated about what kind of life is good, even while they do not abide by that philosophy. Some have built up misguided guilt. Yet others surely believe in a goodly dosage of demagoguery, that their own views will resonate with the public, most of whom may be prone to generate some measure of envy in their hearts about other people's prosperity. Can anything be done to stop all this confusion and injustice about money and those who have a healthy sum of it? For one, it would be helpful if people started to actually think more about the nature of money rather than simply let themselves be guided by their feelings. Then, too, if people realized that those with money are really no different from those without, aside from being more prosperous, they would stop seeing these persons as caricatures from the pages of the old Pravda and The Daily Worker. It would also be helpful if it were recognized more widely that many people's misfortune isn't the price of the fortune and success of others. Life is not a zero sum game-where all the good things that accrued to some have to be taken from others. Just consider that some people benefit from their looks, health or natural talent, without taking any of this from others. Furthermore, throughout the history of civilization there has been an absolute increase in wealth even as there has been a constant increase of the population. In any case, there is altogether too much waste of precious book, newspaper and magazine space devoted to damning money. The fact is that money as such is innocent; and to want more of it is perfectly healthy and justified, provided it is come by honestly and spent wisely and prudently. But even when these conditions aren't satisfied, it isn't the fault of money per se but of those who use it. 1 Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Nominalist and Realist," in The Complete Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson (New York: Wm. H. Wise & Co., 1929), p. 307.