I want to begin with, of all things, American slang. Then I would like to turn briefly to Karl Marx, who had a few things to say about money. I should've waved a buck under the head-waiter's nose. According to the Oxford English Dictionary the first use of the expression 'money talks' was in the Saturday Evening Post in 1903. Since then, according to the Dictionary of American Slang , whenever people use that expression what they are really saying is that wealth is power and that money buys everything.
Money talks is both a vivid and efficient expression.
In two words it expresses a basic fact about the importance of money in social and political life. And if that weren't enough, the expression gives rise to some entertaining flights of fancy. The notion of talking money calls forth the image of dollar bills animated by some foreign spirit, say that of JP Morgan, whispering into the ear of the likes of Bill Gates about the best way to turn a profit or avoid an anti-trust lawsuit. The expression's anthropomorphic dimension calls to mind the image of a currency cocktail party. At the party, bills of various denominations and currencies talk over martinis and manhattans about their travels in the streams of global finance.