What is the worth of people?

Could we live in a world where money serves no purpose? Can we recognize the people of planet are worth more then hoarding meaningless slips of paper that promise the world but only enslaves us.

If removed the worth of money and placed into people, could we come together and build schools and hospitals in every city in the world? Provide food to the hungry simply because they are hungry? Could we help people suffering at the hands of organizations like ISS, simply because evil walks amongst us.

Or is it impossible. Must we be slaves to money because its the only to earn freedom? Must we be a slave to money because its the only way to eat in our societies?

I wish to be in a world where the worth of the person far exceeds any invention of mankind.

a reply to: Eyemin

Yes we could.
but years upon years of people being told they need money will make it hard to abolish.

To be honest, we could achieve a world where it's not ruled by money. No debt, no financial contracts. Post-scarcity. But the selfish few who just want to control the world use the false monetary system to control and enslave. And I guarantee they're too smart to be known, so they use puppets like Rothschilds, Rockefellers to look like the ultimate wealthy enemies hoarding money and power.

Money and wealth/power is the ultimate distraction.

Money and wealth/power is the ultimate distraction.

a reply to: Yeahkeepwatchingme

Lol so if we are smart enough to know they are making us slaves... why not just stop using money. Take away their tools.

originally posted by: Eyemin

Money and wealth/power is the ultimate distraction.

a reply to: Yeahkeepwatchingme

Lol so if we are smart enough to know they are making us slaves... why not just stop using money. Take away their tools.

One person stops using money it won't affect them. Millions, billions? Retreat to the bunkers and wipe em out!

originally posted by: Yeahkeepwatchingme

originally posted by: Eyemin

Money and wealth/power is the ultimate distraction.

a reply to: Yeahkeepwatchingme

Lol so if we are smart enough to know they are making us slaves... why not just stop using money. Take away their tools.

One person stops using money it won't affect them. Millions, billions? Retreat to the bunkers and wipe em out!

What you say seems so terribly likely .

I don 't think that decent ( non military ) people will leave this world alive if they don 't fight their way out like a prison break... then - THEY become military .
The rest of us ? We will keep using money and ( sickeningly ) value people against ' it ' ... or - apocalypse of some sort . Ironic and sad .

One person I think is all it takes... it just takes that one person.. Fear is just a strong presence that prevents myself as i am sure many others as well, from even attempting this. Fears like... What would be the cost of failure? Would it make the world a better place?

The big picture is hard to build sometimes.

www.youtube.com...

"young money love money blood money right
your money war money more money right...
it is sad
we are sad for things we cannot have
but we are not sad for bagdad" - Akala

You could take all the money from all the people in the world,
put it all in a big pile and burn it....and nothing would change.

Out of necessity a new system of barter would replace it, soon
followed by a new currency.

It is the only viable system we humans have to trade our, labor,
our skills, and our resources.

Don't get me wrong, I like your post--it's kind of like a non-musical
version of John Lennon's "Imagine", but it's too late in the game
to change the rules...too many people crowded too densely together
to ever be viable.

fait accompli...

I think a world without money can be created. But, I don't think it would happen unless we have access to free energy, self-replicating machines or the like and ways to create or manipulate matter so flawlessly that we would consider it magic (I think Asimov said very advanced technology could be so sophisticated it would seem like magic to us). Perhaps some day true freedom will happen but even then we would have to remain vigilant and always aware. In a perfect world would we want to be aware? If a perfect world is freedom, money put towards good goals that benefit the world as a whole, would there be a need to worry about freedom and intrusion? I doubt it because no matter what I'm sure there'll be someone who worries about what the facade of utopia obscures.

too many people crowded too densely together
to ever be viable.

This would be best the time... Everyone can see that we can't do this anymore... It is never too late to make this world worth living in again...

OK, there some competing ideas here. First, life is precious and has value, yes, but you are not inherently valuable to the level of being entitled to everything simply because you draw breath. One of the things we have lost sight of in life is that part of the equation is the value we earn for ourselves, and I am not talking money here. I am talking what we choose to make of ourselves.

The value you will have in any form of economy will always in part translate to what you can do for yourself and for others.

Life is precious, but we all have life. It's what you do with it and what you make of it that separates you from everyone else.

Are you going to be the one who sits back and lets everyone else do and demands they give to you or will you be the one working hard for what you have? If you cannot see how the first tends to breed resentment from the latter, then there is a problem. No matter what kind of system we run on, people will always resent the ones who do nothing and demand everything (not the ones who truly cannot do anything) as much as they will envy the ones who do so much and always seem to have it all. This is always going to be the crux of the problem in any system of exchange, money or no.

About $2.95 in raw chemical value

a reply to: Yeahkeepwatchingme

Aiming for an Utopia is a distraction... perfection is impossible proven by nature. Wow, I guess since that is the case maybe its the love of money that is the root of all evil. Since that is still love; is their a way to redirect that in people. Maybe removing money isn't the way to change the world. Maybe instead we should try to change peoples perspective on it. Get them to refocus their love.

What is the worth of people?

Hubble telescope has shown us the vastness of the Known Universe. In all the galaxies and stars that seemingly stretch forever there is but one you. You are singularly unique. So is everyone else.

Everyone one of us is invaluable.

a reply to: ketsuko

Exactly but even then there's people who would think a world without money means just having what you need and sparing the rest for others when they need it. So in a world without money I think people in this stage of evolution would end up bartering and then once again creating classes, both social and economic. A world without money needs maintenance and time devoted to it. As our civilization stands I think it's not possible because many would expect mansions, fast cars, multiple properties and exotic goods that take a toll on the planet's resources. Of course there'd be those who would want just what they need to comfortably survive.

a reply to: ketsuko

What defines a hard worker too you? What do you deem as having it all? Living on a string to prove to myself that placing importance on items that only enable us to discriminate against those who do not have those things, makes us bad people.

I can work hard buy 3 houses and 5 cars. Spend more money on taxes then people make in a year. Would that make me successful?

a reply to: Eyemin

If history has taught us anything, it's that the human race can always make more people, but nobility and net worth are priceless. Throughout the course of our own average lives we toil and aspire to be like the gods of men who rule over us; teapot masters of our own tiny backyard kingdoms. We seek to accumulate wealth while fulfilling society's requirement that we work for forty plus years for fist fulls of sweat and blood stained green ink printed paper, so that at the end our lives we can have enough to survive and just possibly--if we invested smartly enough--realize one or two of the meager dreams we've always held. Dreams the wealthy likely planted in our brains with well targeted advertisements.

Some form of monetary system will always exist. Safe enough then to surmise greed will always trump compassion, envy will always lance from the eyes of the have-nots, and those few who wield fortunes and power and gloriously powerful fortunes will through ownership of the rest play puppet masters with strings easily cut but never severed. Cycle on, cycle on!

Alas visions of a world covered in flowers attended by buzzing fairies who sweat peace and speak universal love will likely remain just that: the fancies of day dreamers. Of course, we all could make the world a better place. Problem is all we know is might makes right. So the value of a human life continues to depreciate in the only place that its worth ever mattered: our hearts.

How I wish and long for the world you speak of...

But, the world in which you seek, will never exist because of one innate human-animal instinct....

Self-preservation.

As long as your instincts tell you to survive, you will find the means necessary. In today's world, those means are through slips of paper in exchange for the things you need to survive. Self-preservation.

When you are starving, you'll go to work... so that you can earn money... so that you can survive. Self-preservation.

So as long as there is constant fear, that you won't be able to survive, that you might not have enough money to eat, or keep your lights on, people will always feel threatened for their self-preservation and ability to survive, which is what keeps us all enslaved.

Money is just an instrument. Behind it, there are many more.

Even if we did away with money, those that have a warped sense of self-preservation, and feel like they need to hoard every resource they can get their hands on (greed), there will likely always be those that have, controlling those that have not.

~Namaste

originally posted by: Eyemin
a reply to: ketsuko

What defines a hard worker too you? What do you deem as having it all? Living on a string to prove to myself that placing importance on items that only enable us to discriminate against those who do not have those things, makes us bad people.

I can work hard buy 3 houses and 5 cars. Spend more money on taxes then people make in a year. Would that make me successful?

So you disdain the by-products of success in this world? If, as you say, we are not going to have money, then the issue of taxes is a moot point. And if someone winds up with three cars, who are you to say that their reasons for it are not valid ones? My family has two because my husband and I both work and we drive in two opposing directions to work. He works in another city and I work in a place that public transport does not reach. Both our cars are 10+ years old, so perhaps that meets with your approval?

So, to me, part of your post seems to be motivated by the envy of those who do not have what others do.

As to working hard, I am talking about the willingness to earn what you have and be satisfied with it. People need to understand that while the willingness to work hard at something is commendable, some types of labor are more valuable than others. Who's contributions are going to be harder to replicate? The fast food worker or the scientist like Stephen Hawking? Who's labor skills are harder to learn and train? The average forklift driver or the average neurosurgeon? Which one does society have more of - the average sales clerk or the average nuclear physicist?

I can agree that your forklift driver can absolutely bust his butt and work much harder than a slacker physicist, but by virtue of skillsets alone, the physicist is usually still going to be worth more unless he gets his butt fired because he is that unwilling to be productive. However, that kick butt forklift driver absolutely ought to be making far more than his compatriot forklift drivers, and it would be a mistake for that forklift driver to look at what the physicist is making and expect to make as much or feel bad because he's not making that much.

And it won't matter if you remove the money, people will still attach values to labor and skills in a similar manner. If it's something everyone can do with very little training, then it won't command as much compensation as compared to something that needs a lot of training and specialized knowledge. This is the way it has always been. I'll bet if you went back to the days of the cavemen, they were doing it much the same way even without money

The real problem is that we have people who cheat the system at the top and corrupt the whole value of what you do. If you had a currency based on time and effort alone with no allowance for usury you could have a fair system where all could afford the services they provide. There is a sickness in a system when a person can put in the same effort and time that is needed to create the materials to a house and build that house but not own that house forever paying part of time/effort for others for the right to exist in the house.

Capitalism do not work since the free market is a illusion and monopoly and oligopolies are the real controllers of the world economy and therefor the politicians also. It is the way greed always end. Trickle up to those who have power to abuse the system and force the system to give them advantages.

In soviet it was the politicians who ruled the state controlled capitalistic system and got the power. In western countries it is the owners of the banks who control the game. Still the same pyramid scheme where many feed the few at the top.