Have you ever wondered what money really is [and why we need to own some gold as a result]? You’ll notice that everyone you read has a strong opinion , but who’s right? [Let look at the situation and see if we can come to an answer that we both can agree on.] Words: 3086
So says Danny B (www.fofoa.blogspot.com) in edited excerpts from his original article*.
Lorimer Wilson, editor of www.FinancialArticleSummariesToday.com (A site for sore eyes and inquisitive minds) and www.munKNEE.com (Your Key to Making Money!) has edited ([ ]), abridged (…) and reformatted (some sub-titles and bold/italics emphases) the article below for the sake of clarity and brevity to ensure a fast and easy read. The report’s views and conclusions are unaltered and no personal comments have been included to maintain the integrity of the original article. Please note that this paragraph must be included in any article re-posting to avoid copyright infringement.The article goes on to say, in part, that:
Is money really just one single thing and then everything else has varying levels of moneyness relative to real money? [For instance:]
- is gold real money?
- is money whatever the government says it is?
- is money whatever the market says it is?
- is silver money in any way today?
- are US Treasury bonds money?
- is real money just the monetary base or is money all the credit that refers back to that base for value?
- is money supposed to be something tangible, or is it simply a common unit we use to express the relative value of things?
- is money really the actual medium of exchange we use in trade or is it the unit of account the various media of exchange (checks, credit cards, PayPal) reference for value?
- should the reference point unit of money itself ever be the medium of exchange? Some of the time? All of the time? Never?
- is money a store of value and, if so, for how long?
- is money supposed to be the fixed reference point (the benchmark) for changes in the value of everything else or is it simply a shared language for expressing those changes?
- is money something that changes over time or is money’s true essence the same concept that first emerged thousands of years ago?
- and probably the most important question: does the correct view of money produce answers that are vastly superior to the blind conjecture prescribed by all other views.
Answers
Everyone has a strong opinion about what money actually is so “everyone” will probably disagree with what I write but that doesn’t mean they are right and I am wrong. I want to challenge you to use your own mind and see for yourself. Take what I say and then take what they say, compare, contrast, analyze and then decide for yourself. The prescription produced by my view is quite simple – and only you can decide if it is vastly superior to their blind conjecture.
The Pure Concept of Money
According to Webster’s the word ‘money’ emerged in the English language sometime during the Medieval period in Europe, maybe around the late 1200s. Wikipedia suggests a possible etymology originating with the Greek word for ‘unique’ or ‘unit’. The Western term for physical coins that emerged sometime around the late 1500s was ‘specie’ from the Latin phrase for “in kind” or “payment in kind,” meaning “payment in the actual or real form.” The word ‘currency’ came a little later from the Latin word for current or flow, and was married to the money concept in 1699 by the philosopher John Locke who described the “circulation of money” as a flow or current of monetary payments made in specie.
Etymology is important, because with money or “the moneyness of things” we are talking about a vital concept that predates the word by thousands of years and it’s only by understanding the pure concept that we can see the ways the word has been bastardized by…[the debtors and the savers] over centuries. The meaning we commonly assign to words may change over time, but that never changes the original concept underlying the emergence of the word in the first place.
Case in point: Is ‘money’ equal to ‘wealth’? Is “gathering wealth” the same as “gathering money?” [Such an understanding of just what those words actually meant in the language of the time can be seen in the way Proverbs 13:11 was translated over the passage of time]… and which I think will help to illustrate my point about words and concepts:
(Wycliffe Bible 1395) Hasted chattel, that is, gotten hastily, shall be made less; but that which is gathered little and little with hand, shall be multiplied.
(King James Version 1611) Wealth gotten by vanity shall be diminished: but he that gathereth by labour shall increase.
(Young’s Literal Translation 1862) Wealth from vanity becometh little, and whoso is gathering by the hand becometh great…
[The Living Bible Version 1967) Wealth from gambling quickly disappears; wealth from hard work grows.]....
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