What is Money? (Part 3)
Asking yourself "What is Money?" is the 1st step into a philosophical rabbit-hole that could prove to be the most fascinating intellectual journey of your life…
The question “What is Money?” is deceivingly simple. One would expect the answer to be abundantly clear given its prevalence in daily life, but upon further reflection, most find money to be mysterious. Money is an all-pervasive economic ether, an interpenetrating field influencing human perception, thought, and action. Yet despite the “everywhere and nowhere” nature of money, its deepest truths remain hidden in plain sight. Here, we explore yet another answer to this question, money is…
A Device for Moving Value Across Spacetime
“Value is not intrinsic, it is not in things. It is within us; it is the way in which man reacts to the conditions of his environment.”—Mises
Value is strictly a nonmaterial, relative quality. As humans set aims and take action in attempts to satisfy their wants, anything that accelerates them on the course toward their goal is “valuable” whereas anything irrelevant is “valueless,” and anything impeding their progress is “anti-valuable.” Value can never be objectively “intrinsic” to any tangible good; it is always determined by wants, which are inherently subjective. Said succinctly: wants determine value.
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When you decide to cross the street, you are expressing the decision that the other side is more valuable to you. All humans reveal their rank-ordered scales of value exclusively through action as each chooses the single most valuable course to them at the unavoidable exclusion of all others, in all places and at all times. Everyone expresses their unique value scales in the reality of action—indeed, there is no other way. Value is why “actions speak louder than words.”
If value is nonmaterial and subjective, how can money objectively move it across spacetime? The thread commonly woven throughout individual interpretations of value is human life. The fruits of human time, effort, and ingenuity produce almost everything other humans find relevant to solving their own problems. Therefore, an instrument commanding maximal marketability gives market actors the widest possible choice across the diversity of skills, knowledge, and capital commanded by other humans.
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When trading a good for money, the seller takes possession of a token that can be traded for any other good in the marketplace. As other market actors seek to satisfy their wants through trade, they eye the money held by the seller, and all others, as an accelerant toward achieving their own aims. In other words, when people trade, the most marketable good (money) has the highest probability of being perceived as valuable by others in pursuit of their own want-satisfactions. In this way, whether choosing to trade or hold a cash position, market actors use money as a device for moving value across spacetime. In receiving or spending money, a market actor moves value across space; by saving money, a market actor moves value across time.
Fascinating so far, right? All insights springing from diving into a seemingly shallow question. But value is such a subjective matter, how is it that money is anchored in objective reality? Deeper we must go: money is…
In Part 4, we will explore money as the highest form of energy humans can channel…
Thank you for reading What is Money? (Part 3).
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