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Money is really an IOU from society to you. Money did not originate as a mediator in a barter system, but rather as a unit of account to keep track of who owes

Money is really an IOU from society to you. Money did not originate as a mediator in a barter system, but rather as a unit of account to keep track of who owes whom, at least that's the predominant theory amongst monetary theorists nowadays. [1] If I take you out for a beer, "This one's on me", but there's an implication that you "owe me one", and you buy me a beer next time. Do this amongst many people and many scenarios, and eventually you need to keep track of who owes whom by tallying it on some bone or giving a shiny rock in return to a neighbor that gave you some eggs. And/or, a king raises an army, invades your village and orders you to pay tax by sending your grain to the temple. The king needs this surplus because maybe the Euphrates won't flood as much this year, and he will lose power if his soldiers and priests starve. So, you bring your grain to the temple, the priest tallies your contribution on a clay tablet, and gives you receipts. Soldiers later stop by your house and you give them some receipts to prove you paid your debt. At least this one conception of how things went. Looking at money as an IOU really causes you to look at it differently. The amount of money you have is really a measure of how much trust and value you have put into your society. If I repair someone's roof for $1,000, I spend hours of my day doing it, and I'll never get that time back. I get money, which I trust will let me buy food tomorrow. It's a measure of the debt society owes to me for the value I have provided. Hopefully society doesn't deem that measure worthless by then. Interestingly, this is basically why the dollar is the world's reserve currency. People trust it a lot. It's also one theory as to what led to the deindustrialization of the USA. When the dollar became the gold standard in 1971, everyone wanted dollars, and so we exported our dollars, which we can just print, and imported cheap manufactured goods. Who benefits? The people that make dollars, Washington and Wall St. Who loses? People who manufactured goods in the USA. This shrunk our manufacturing base and caused the enormous wealth inequality in America today. Anyways, if money really is a measure of how much trust and value I've put into a society, then it's interesting why we pursue it so much, beyond the fact that (usually) it gets us food and shelter. Perhaps it's just because a side effect of having put in so much trust and value into a society is that society will give you status symbols in return, so you can attract a mate. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_money#Prehistory:_predecessors_of_money_and_its_emergence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_money#Prehistory:_p...

card_zero 2y ago
It's pleasant (and perhaps beneficial) to be relaxed about who owes you what, of course, instead of keeping a precise score. But then this throws us open to exploitation by mean-minded people with an angle. There's something to say here about the fuzzy border between friends, strangers, and rivals, but I can't formulate it. I agree with your concept of money, but extend it slightly: I see money in its ideal form as a token that says "I pleased somebody". By passing it on, you can get somebody to please you. That's equivalent to saying it's all about debt, but shifts the focus by introducing a connection to happiness.
- cynicalpeace 2y ago
  It's an interesting idea, I would agree that that's money in its ideal form. There's a push and pull to it though too, because when you accumulate money, it's not just that you may have pleased someone, but that you have placed your trust into that money, that it will be worth something tomorrow, and thereby you have placed your trust into society at large. So money is not just tracking how much value you have added, but also how much trust you have put in.
  - card_zero 2y ago
    Yeah, and the part about "we can just print dollars" comes down to lending and investment, I guess, and so it's more like "we believe in you" than "you have pleased us".
    - cynicalpeace 2y ago
      The "we can just print dollars" part is wild. Especially since the world really wants these dollars. Any other country would see rampant inflation immediately. Instead, we've exported these dollars worldwide, enriched the money printers and destroyed our middle class. Understanding how this works made me think that reforming international trade is the way to ameliorate wealth inequality in the USA, rather than progressive taxation. This is basically JD Vance's stance.

card_zero 2y ago

It's pleasant (and perhaps beneficial) to be relaxed about who owes you what, of course, instead of keeping a precise score. But then this throws us open to exploitation by mean-minded people with an angle. There's something to say here about the fuzzy border between friends, strangers, and rivals, but I can't formulate it. I agree with your concept of money, but extend it slightly: I see money in its ideal form as a token that says "I pleased somebody". By passing it on, you can get somebody to please you. That's equivalent to saying it's all about debt, but shifts the focus by introducing a connection to happiness.

cynicalpeace 2y ago
It's an interesting idea, I would agree that that's money in its ideal form. There's a push and pull to it though too, because when you accumulate money, it's not just that you may have pleased someone, but that you have placed your trust into that money, that it will be worth something tomorrow, and thereby you have placed your trust into society at large. So money is not just tracking how much value you have added, but also how much trust you have put in.
- card_zero 2y ago
  Yeah, and the part about "we can just print dollars" comes down to lending and investment, I guess, and so it's more like "we believe in you" than "you have pleased us".
  - cynicalpeace 2y ago
    The "we can just print dollars" part is wild. Especially since the world really wants these dollars. Any other country would see rampant inflation immediately. Instead, we've exported these dollars worldwide, enriched the money printers and destroyed our middle class. Understanding how this works made me think that reforming international trade is the way to ameliorate wealth inequality in the USA, rather than progressive taxation. This is basically JD Vance's stance.