Our present monetary system, far from being an efficient generator of wealth, actually erects many serious obstacles to wealth creation and preservation. Below are the top ten obstacles, but first, let's define Real Wealth.
What Is Real Wealth?
Tangible:
Developed: tools & machines, buildings & infrastructure (roads, utilities, airports etc.) plus all of our material goods
Undeveloped: natural resources
Non-tangible:
Developed: knowledge, talents, skills & abilities, creativity, good health
Undeveloped: freedom, privacy, security, friendship, love & compassion
Notice that money, stocks, bonds etc. are not included anywhere above. They are merely paper claims against the underlying Real Wealth of the issuer.
Top Ten Obstacles To Real Wealth
Unemployment: A shortage of money creates unemployment, which wastes valuable human resources. Society could generate far more Real Wealth if everyone was working. A subset of unemployment is under-employment. Many people willing to work full-time are only able to find part-time jobs. Also many people who are trained and skilled in various fields are unable to find work in those areas so they work at jobs well below their potential. Under-employment also wastes valuable human resources and robs society of the Real Wealth that these people could be producing if only more jobs were available.
Under-training: Many people who would like to can't afford to complete a full university or college training program. Some people, for financial reasons, cannot even finish high school. Again this is a tragic waste of human resources and society would be much more productive (and hence wealthier) if everyone was able, through proper training, to develop their maximum potential.
Unpaid work: Much of the work that contributes to society's Real Wealth is unpaid and therefore is not counted under our present monetary system. Raising kids, caring for our sick or aged friends and family members, volunteering and community service work, etc.... our current monetary system has no way to monetize the value of, or to reward and encourage the generation of this Real Wealth.
Under-development of infrastructure: A shortage of money prevents the adequate renewal of roads, bridges, public utilities, airports, schools, hospitals, parks & recreational facilities, military, police, fire & ambulance services, public transit, affordable housing and homes for the aged. Yet these are the very things that constitute Real Wealth, so how can a lack of that which is supposed to represent Real Wealth (money) limit the creation of the Real Wealth itself. Society would be richer and much better off with renewed infrastructures and adequate social programs and services. The only thing that is holding us back is our present monetary system's reliance on a managed scarcity of money. This deliberate shortage of money enables an elite group of credit creators to profit from charging interest on the money they loan. Interest merely siphons of a portion of the borrower's reward for his productive labor and transfers it to the lender who does nothing productive himself to earn the money taken.
Wasted Natural Resources: Our economy depends on continual consumption to operate. When many people find money scarce, price becomes important. To keep costs down, product quality & durability suffers. Things are made so that they wear out quickly. This helps ensure continual consumption. The growing number of disposable "convenience" products is evidence of this. Changing fashions and styles also encourage premature obsolescence and help ensure continual consumption. All this crap wastes our precious natural resources, our Real Wealth, and disposing of it puts an additional burden on our environment. Fierce competition in the marketplace causes manufacturers to design elaborate packaging & marketing materials simply to try and sell more products... more wasted natural resources. Just-in-time production schedules and globalized supply chains mean raw materials, components and finished products traverse the globe numerous times before being assembled and shipped to their final end user. This unnecessary transportation wastes a tremendous amount of energy resources (plus the human resources involved in the logistics).
Resource Degradation: In the process of trying to earn paper wealth, our society is depleting & destroying it's Real Wealth by polluting the air and water, destroying unrestorable habitats, species and life forms along with many unrealized alternative ways of doing things (i.e. unrecoverable lost possibilities and knowledge). Disregarding nature's needs, we are depleting our clean air and water supplies, deforesting the planet and destroying the natural fertility of our top soils & farmlands. The earth's oil & gas reserves are disappearing, fish stocks are getting critically low and global warming is accelerating. We simply can't go on using an economic system that ignores nature's needs. Our present monetary & economic system also places a tremendous amount of stress on human beings, degrading the quality of our human resources as well (i.e. insecurity, fear, depression, illness, crime, war).
Non-productive Activities: A host of totally non-productive tasks and occupations are necessary under our present monetary system. Complex taxation & accounting systems, hundreds of income redistribution programs, thousands of money lending & collection activities, elaborate marketing & sales operations, endless legal disputes and, of course, a multitude of criminal activities caused by poverty, bankruptcy, fraud... all require huge material & human resources. Imagine how much more Real Wealth could be generated if all these resources were used productively in a more cooperative economic system.
Money leaks value: Money doesn't store value well at all. Inflation robs money of its value over time. If the money supply doesn't increase at, at least, the rate of inflation, our ability to create new Real Wealth will be restricted by a lack of money.
Money misrepresents value: Money is not anchored to anything tangible. A dollar has no inherent value of its own. It is a symbol with no fixed value. Imagine if we used such a symbol for exchanging products by weight. Suppose a pound had 16 ounces one day, but only 15 the next. How would we ever measure a pound? What scale could we ever trust to be accurate? This ambiguity of money allows it to be manipulated and misrepresented unmercifully. It also makes it subject to huge amounts of depreciation. A tremendous amount of Real Wealth has been lost in stock market meltdowns, bankruptcies and bad debts. Financial instruments (invested money) become worthless overnight. Underlying assets are liquidated at greatly depreciated prices.
Uneven wealth distribution: Excessive wealth for a tiny minority of the world's population leads to an extravagant waste of resources. Nobody needs a 250,000 sq. ft. home, a couple of vacation homes, a private jet, a dozen cars and a 120 ft. yacht... at least not until there are no sick or starving people anywhere in the world. If everyone was able to develop and contribute his or her full potential, society could achieve an enormous increase in productivity. Instead of fighting competitively for scarce money, we could work together cooperatively to extend pure science and to develop ecologically sustainable technologies to work in harmony with our natural resources. Our human and natural resources are the source of our Real Wealth.
The exploitive nature of our tightly controlled private credit system destroys human potential from the inside out. Fear, tension, exhaustion, frustration, anger, depression have all been accepted as being a part of normal life, yet it doesn't have to be that way. The extra Real Wealth that society would achieve by eliminating them alone would make all of the effort it will take to reform our monetary system worthwhile.
What do you say... are you up to it? Get in touch.
