Do we even need money?

I was wondering if we even needed money. I just thought I'd pose the question here since I don't know other more appropriate places to put it. I'm not saying we should go communist. What I'm asking is what if we could develop technology that could suit any of our needs that we wanted? What if we could have the kind of technology that would allow us to at our leisure- get what we want when we want it? Say we want food- we could rearrange atoms in such a way that could give us that food. We would still have free trade... and trade with other humans... what I'm wondering is if we even need money. It's like money is invisible. Yet it is real. Do we even need it?

[edit on 22-8-2009 by Frankidealist35]

reply to post by Frankidealist35


No one "needs" money.
We "need" resources, and money is a tool to cultivate them.
Money is the middle man, so to speak.
Money is the root of every single problem.
The reason for this is, much like our environment, we have taken ourselves out of the picture when it comes to the cultivation and acquisition of resources.
The average person knows nothing about the intrinsic value of labor and what it takes to create or cultivate anything.
Money separates us from those resources, much like we are separated from the environment.
The more we rely on it, the more defendant we become.
The more dependent we become, the more we can't live without it.

Personally, I hate money.
It is only a tool and is only good for what it's used for.
If I cannot buy something with it, it has another useful value. Tinder.

My grandparents had very little money and they could create what they needed almost out of thin air, they called it a garden. Miraculous thing that brought forth all the food they needed year around. They had to can it, if they wanted tomatoes in the winter, but from what I understand it was well worth it.

There was a time, not so long ago, when very few people had any money at all. They raised chickens and livestock and gardened.....and paid their bills with pigs and fresh corn.

I'd rather have money though. I want internet tubes and tele's that cover my wall and fast food I don't cook or can and have friends all over the world that I talk to daily......

Being self sufficient is nice, having money is better....

reply to post by mrwupy


Being self sufficient eliminates the need for money.
That is until you become convinced that you must have things that you don't need.

Do we *need* money? Of course not. Is it a good way of keeping track of resources? Yes.

Most societies had some medium of exchange. In the majority of cases, it was some sort of money - coins, gold, currency, something to represent value. You did something, made something, whatever, and you were given money. You took that money and traded it for something you needed - food, clothes, tools, whatever. Barter was always possible - still is - but it's inefficient. You have to find someone who wants what you have to offer, and who has what you want. That can't always happen. For instance, if you make shoes, the only guy looking for shoes might be trying to sell fish; but you've got a ton of fish already, can't eat it all before it goes bad. More fish isn't going to work. So you accept money instead.

I think our problem is that money has gotten too far removed from what it's supposed to be. It became something of value in and of itself, instead of just representing things of value. As long as money was just representing so many fish or shoes or hours of labor, it was fine. But once it became valuable by itself, we lost sight of reality. We based our economy on the value of money, but it has none. It's paper and ink. And not even that - I have read somewhere (I'm sorry I don't have a link to it) that paper money represents only 10% of our total "money". The rest is "electronic", just numbers in computers somewhere, nothing more. I find that kind of scary, really...

We don't need money, and we definitely do not need to go back to some kind of bartering system.

If you have not heard of the Venus Project before i would highly recommend checking it out:

www.thevenusproject.com

What we need are human beings being educated to actually solve our problems, like someone has said before, the only way we'll solve the world's problems today is if someone can figure out how to make money doing it.

reply to post by reticledc


Money isn't a tool to cultivate resources, it is a tool to limit, and control resources. It's needed by those in control to keep everyone else under control.

reply to post by SpacePunk


I stand corrected.
It should be used for the purpose I mentioned.
But as any other tool, there is indeed a right and wrong way to use them.
Thank you for illustrating that point.
Where's my head at?
Don't answer that.

[edit on 8/22/2009 by reticledc]

We dont need money, or credits or credit cards or wall street for that matter, nor the federal reserve. Afriend fo mine back in mid 90's was in marines, and educated me and others, on the NWO, their agenda, ect ect. SO, one night he was talking to us about no need for money. Bartering. Bartering happnes to work, its been proven time and time again, and dosnt really rouse up such a fight over it, like people would murder to have the greenpaper. Bartering was used for god knows how many centurys, and no one ever died form it. Now money, people die from wanting and needing it everyday!
Yuor neighbor has sugar yuo need, you have a roll of toilet paper. Make the exchange! the exchange will last eachother jsut enough time to enjoy eachothers trade. hell you might make friends!
In todays world, fo course, bartering might be questionable. well a safety risk rather. Example..back in 1984, i was 10, my cousin wa 11. Halloween night, she bit into a reeses peanut butter cup, and some effin $%^&^$$ had put a razor blade in it. She was in emergency, hospitol getting many stiches, and had to wear a headset for a good 3 years after that. POlice never did find who did it, but it was suspected, someone in our neighnorhood. nother example, remember in the mid 80'
s witht hte tylenol cyandie tameprings? some psycho was ijecting cyanide into the lquigels, then putting them back on the shelf.
The point im truying make, and hopefully is obvious, since bartering frist started, people are less and less reliabel and trustworthy these days. so ide DEF be careful, especially if its NWOknida thing goin on, martial law. Yuor neighbor knows yuo got stuff he wants,. HE might think, just more aor for him to breath, to possess yuor belongings.
just my 2 cents and speaking my mind here.

I once had a substitute teacher in 3rd grade, this was in 1978. She said then that one day we would no longer use paper money, and that we would use computers to do all of our shopping. Visionary eh.

There is no need for money, nor even the concept of money. Imagine going to get something you need that you don't personally produce. You walk into a shop. The shop exists because that person wants to be a shopkeeper. That's his personal place of joy. You pick up what you need and walk out. You work the same way. The job you do, you do because it brings you joy. Every moment you work is for the joy of that task. You learned it easily because you love it. Somehow you are naturally adept at it. And you have plenty of time to spend with those you love. There is no punching a clock because you aren't reliant on pay.

Imagine all the ramifications of a world without money. No one would need to steal because everything can and is produced for free. No one tries to muscle anyone else for anything. Why would you? Keep that thought flowing and spilling into all the issues that would be resolved if everything had equal value. Think about it. If you really need some water, it's more important to you than jewelry. If you really love what someone has produced but there's no price tag on it, you like it *because you like it*, not because it has any externally ascribed value. It's value lies in your preference. Keep that idea spilling over onto all aspects of life. You see where I'm going?

I wrote this same thing in a thread about a year ago. It was ignored then. Have any of you seen the light yet?

Money, is a concept.
We buy, sell and trade, based on a concept, that has no longer become tangible.
I have read and posted replies about the VENUS PROJECT.
In some aspects, it seems rather socialist, and I will not go into my views on that, as to not incite a riot.
In other aspects it's visionary, and I feel that we could go that way.
I think that we should at least try to find a middle ground to work from.
Some concepts from everything, the most paramount of which, relies on the people controlling the wealth, not the wealth controlling the people.
But then again, we have a vast monetary, military, industrial complex to lay hammers to.

You mention some sort of technology that would rearrange raw material into whatever you want/need.
The obvious limitation is ''raw material''.
At that point, the base material is more precious than gold.
So let's say that somebody invents that wonderful device....



If I could get access to that device I would make weapons with it.
Then what would YOU do?



At least when people are tangled up in MONEY they are restricted.
Those monetary shackles help to maintain peace and order.

You can't have folks running around doing whatever they want, whenever they please.

This is a thread of idealistic insanity.

The problem is not everyone can have a garden. Not everyone can have livestock.

So there are inner cities and ghettos where peolpe have to do labor to be paid.

When that labor is complete and they wish to go home to their small inner city apartments how shall they be paid?

With a chicken? I think not. Money is the only fair way to give compensation.

Without money we would have all beeen dead long ago fighting for resources and the advantage over the other guy.

While I completely agree the system is not perfect by any means, I believe it is malleable and adaptable enough that when it is neccessary to change it it can be shaped into a more fair system...eventually.

You would think that with everything that has been invented and not marketed to the public, that the world could at least be allowed to evolve into the Jetson age already. I don't know what the governments of the world are waiting for, or are they going to insist that the masses of people remain technologically retarded forever? We don't need money. All we need is a card with points earned and points spent or a bracelet that scans. No chip implants though. That's gross. I realize that Big Brother has been "watching" everyone for decades, maybe even since ancient times. There has always been some "all-knowing" eye spying on people, whether it be aliens or the governments. They don't have to brand the cattle, so to speak. But money is pretty useless. If we lived off of points, then there wouldn't be any bank robberies or gas station robberies or anything that involved the paper dollar. Crime would be forced to be cut down. Now the buying what we want when we want it... That would be no different than credit, only we would be in debt to earning the points to cover what we borrowed and that would enslave us to a certain extent. Then again, anyone with a credit card is being enslaved to pay it off. But we also must enslave ourselves to work just to survive. Even homesteaders have to pay taxes, so there is no way around the slave to the money issue unless you want to be a criminal for lack of paying taxes or you just want to be a hobo. Who wants to be a hobo? What kind of life is that?

money is a tool for a "better" living.