If one were to ask random people the following question, “If you found a backpack on the sidewalk with a million dollars in it, would you turn the money in or keep it?” you would find the answer to be almost unanimous, they would keep it. In a world where honesty and trust are preached by many people, it seems odd that such a great number of us would take the money without a second thought. What ever happened to the integrity we were taught in Boy Scouts or Girl Scouts? It is astonishing how swiftly those morals are forgotten when money is involved, but it does happen. A lot of people today think that money is everything and will do whatever it takes to get more of it so they can “move up” on today’s social ladder, but is it worthwhile?

Now if I may digress for a paragraph, let us look at what money truly is on a physical level, a piece of green printed paper with miniscule strips of metal inserted in them that have no true value. It seems ironic to me that people’s lives revolve around flimsy green strips of paper that have little to no value in all reality. A dollar bill only has value because someone deemed it to be our medium of exchange that we can use to barter for goods or services. Back in the days before our currency was developed people actually traded useful goods with each other rather than dollar bills for the products, dating back to even the cavemen, and they seemed to get along just fine without our currency. For example, if caveman Ogg wanted neighboring caveman Grunt’s stone, he would offer to trade his stick for the stone and not some worthless object, like a fingernail, which Grunt had no need for. Long ago a man’s wealth may have been measured by how many goats or horses he owned, not how many pieces of paper he could store away in a little confined room. But no matter what objects we use for our medium of exchange there will still be those people who want more of it, and they will do whatever it takes to get it. But why use green printed paper? Well, it is light-weight and easy to carry around in large quantities and easy to reproduce. Could you imagine trying to take fifty horses across the entire country? And you would have to feed and groom the horses and keep them in good health as well, so I suppose our beloved money is much better in that sense. But then again, how many more uses does a horse have than money? Well, money is good for only one thing that I can see: as a medium of exchange. Horses can be ridden on when one must travel, and can be a comforting household pet as well. Can money do those things? Not the last time I checked, but then why use these pieces of paper? Well, I suppose it is for the reasons I stated earlier; it is light-weight, easily transported over long distances, and easily produced but not easily replicated.

If money is the best thing for us to use as this medium of exchange, then how come it brings about so many problems? Well, let us use Ogg and Grunt again in this example of why problems arise, no matter what form our currency is. If Ogg has three frog heads, each frog head being equivalent to a thousand dollars, and seven rat tails valued at a hundred dollars each, then he has a total of three thousand and seven hundred dollars, right? Now let us say that Grunt has just found a perfectly smooth granite stone wheel and Ogg is fascinated by the wheel and wants to trade with Grunt for it, but Grunt does not want to trade his wheel for anything less than twelve frog heads and four rat tails. Obviously these frog heads and rat tails are not easy to get and Ogg really wants that wheel, so he decides to show Grunt his new wooden club by smacking it over Grunt’s head and takes the wheel. This leaves Ogg with three frog heads, seven rat tails, a new wooden club that has only been used once, as well as a perfectly smooth stone wheel, whereas Grunt now has none of these. This angers Grunt very much, but he goes off into the mountain because he now has nothing. While Ogg is happily enjoying his wealth Grunt is struggling to survive, constantly cursing Ogg’s name and vowing for revenge. One day Grunt comes across a sharp, six inch thick piece of shale and a nice sturdy stick. He fastens the shale onto the stick and travels back to where Ogg is living peacefully and prosperously, revenge foremost on Grunt’s mind. One day while Ogg is picking flowers for his new-found love Bertha, Grunt spots him and decides to repay the favor Ogg gave to him and introduces Ogg to his new axe before taking back what was his. Grunt then gets the three frog heads, seven rat tails, a semi-new wooden club, a perfectly smooth stone wheel, a new shale axe that has only been used one, and Bertha. Poor Ogg, however, does not even get a decent burial after all that has happened, but he does make a nice snack for the local buzzards.

So now we see that any form of currency or exchange can easily lead to disaster, so why on earth would anyone want more money if it might bring about more problems? After all, not everything has a price tag on it, so why do all these people want enormous quantities of money? Some may want more to be able to help others who are in need, doing a noble deed with the excess cash flow. Some would like money to be able to live comfortably without having to worry about not being able to pay for their expenses. Others want it to spoil their families or spouses with gifts and other niceties that money can buy. And then there are those who want it for what money represents: power. The power to do almost anything they want because, even though I hate to admit this, most people will easily succumb under the influence of someone with great wealth who offers them money in exchange for something the rich person desires. This is why millionaires are seemingly above the law, because people can be bought off, and even most jail sentences carry a price tag which can be removed for a predetermined sum of cash.

So let us recap for a moment, money equals power and money also equals trouble. Does that mean that power equals trouble? I’ll leave that one up to you to decide, but one thing I do know for sure is that money pretty much rules the lives of people everywhere. We work endless hours throughout our lives for it, and we buy luxuries with that money which we earn at our jobs. Even things that are vital for our survival, such as food, drink, and shelter carry price tags on them. Without money we would be lost, forced to fight for our own survival against the elements and the rest of mankind and only the fittest would be able to survive. Would things be better off if life was like that? Who knows, but I suppose we shall all have to make do with what we have for now and allow our lives to revolve around the thing we call money.