Talk:Money/Archive 1

message: There are all sorts of different types of discrimination, race, gender, sexuality, etc etc. What about discrimination by financial circumstance???
Money is a good or token used as a means of exchange? I know it is much more than that, and I believe the intoroduction to this article should be heavily reviewed...
- Money is a source of discrimination within society.
- Money determines your social status, quality of life, health among many other things, in modern society.
- Money seperates society in divisions categorised by itself.
- Money is a motivating factor in developing and expirienceing the human emotion known as greed.
- Money is forced upon a human beings lifestyle, quality of life, right to live, health, wellbeing, etc etc.
Please - fix up this article, it reads as though it has been written by a pro-democracy government body, and as though it is promoting money as these things stated in this article.
Please - add my points in one form or another to a section "Undesireable features of money"
Please - do not put me in my place, I know I can't spell or convey my neutral point of view as well as others can, It's not my fault my parents and their parents and their parents didnt have as much money as some people, and there are way more people far worse off than me.
Please - perhaps create a section on "Discrimination by Financial Circumstance" as I and I'm positive many billions of others feel it is a major issue and must be adressed in a wikipedia article on money.
Note: I can think of a million non-NPOV things to say and add to this article but I've tried my best to convey some of the relevant points.
================================
Comments on this section, by EditorASC:
I think it would be a major mistake, to pollute a discussion of what money is, with political agenda comments like this.  If that is allowed, then Wikipedia will soon be considered just another political agenda forum, among many on the Internet.
Money is a tool, which men have invented to facilitate commerce. An invention of necessity, because of the inherent limitations of barter.  
I have no problem with discussing what are the most common definitions of "money," and "money supply," but I do have a problem with polluting this kind of scholarly discussion with "it isn't fair that some have more money than others."  That kind of political rhetoric should be reserved for a section, which deals with various historic economic policies of governments, not in a discussion about what money is and how it is expanded and contracted.
If we were discussing farm tractors, and how they can be used (what kind of "tool" they are), then it would be highly inappropriate (because it is irrelevant) to inject into the discussion, the fact that some farmers have more tractors than other farmers.  That serves only to distract from the discussion of what the tool "farm tractor" is.  
Thank you,
--EditorASC 06:03, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Discrimination by Financial Circumstance

message: Comments on this section, by EditorASC:
I think it would be a major mistake, to pollute a discussion of what money is, with political agenda comments like this.  If that is allowed, then Wikipedia will soon be considered just another political agenda forum, among many on the Internet.
Money is a tool, which men have invented to facilitate commerce. An invention of necessity, because of the inherent limitations of barter.  
I have no problem with discussing what are the most common definitions of "money," and "money supply," but I do have a problem with polluting this kind of scholarly discussion with "it isn't fair that some have more money than others."  That kind of political rhetoric should be reserved for a section, which deals with various historic economic policies of governments, not in a discussion about what money is and how it is expanded and contracted.
If we were discussing farm tractors, and how they can be used (what kind of "tool" they are), then it would be highly inappropriate (because it is irrelevant) to inject into the discussion, the fact that some farmers have more tractors than other farmers.  That serves only to distract from the discussion of what the tool "farm tractor" is.  
Thank you,
--EditorASC 06:03, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: ====================

message: * Why is money so important...to me, an outsider i just consider it 'mental credit' and nothing else. I really don't see the purpose of it rather than to just keep a score card against other human beings.
* so 1)what is money?  2)Why do we need it? 3) Why is it meaningful. im not expecting to answer all three but the last one is the most important.
::*I dont know how to say this niceley but you really should take an intro econ course to get a clue
*The definition for money in this article is flawed, although it is a commonly accepted definition. At best, the definition provided in the article describes the effects of money. Here are new definitions derived from the NESARA Institute:
Money: A psychological creation; a concept; the mental image of that which is used as a medium of exchange.
Currency: That which circulates as a medium of exchange; anything that is in immediate, continuous and widespread use as money.
In other words, nobody can physically touch money, no more than they can touch a pound or an inch or a second. Money is conceptual in nature. Currency, however, the thing that represents money, can be touched. Just as a person can touch a scale to measure weight, a ruler to measure distance, or a clock to measure time. Currency is that which is used as money. Over time, the "used as" was dropped for simplicity. If no one objects, I'd like to insert this information in a new section called "Other Definitions". Does anyone have comments on this before I do so? inigmatus 16:41, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: What is money? Why do we need it? Why is it meaningful?

message: I was thinking: money is a unit of account; in the US, the smallest unit of account is the cent. So I was thinking, the US monetary system is not based on the dollar, but the cent. Just food for thought :)
Dullfig 17:13, 7 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Unit of account: penny or dollar?

message: I'd like to show why Governments gravitate towards fiat money (money without intrinsic value). Fiat money is a form of hidden taxation. Bare with me, read the whole thing, because I think it is an important concept.
First, I think a recap of commodity money is required (apologies to those who know this already): intrinsic value means the money has value by itself. Value is a combination of desireability, and human labor. In other words, Gold is valuable because it is a pretty, durable metal that everyone likes, and it takes a lot of work to get. If gold was just laying around in big piles, it wouldn't be very valuable. So here is a transaction between two people, using commodity money:
:*Person "A" is a miner. he digs a hole in the ground, and finds a gold nugget.
:*Person "B" makes pottery. he takes some mud, shapes it, fires it, and bingo, he makes a pot.
:*Person "A" wants a pot, goes to "B" and offers the gold nugget in exchange for the pot. They agree to do this. Why? because "B" thinks making pots is easy (he's done it his whole life), but would not even beging to know how to go about digging for gold. So "B" thinks he is comming out ahead, and besides he can turn around and trade the gold to someone else in exchange for food. "A" thinks HE is making out, because he's been digging for gold his whole life, but couldn't make a decent pot to save his life. 
So there you have it, a complete transaction. The important thing to remember is this: with commodity money each participant expended his own work to put value into an object. So they are exchanging work for work.
Now let's take the example cited below of a parent handing out business cards in exchange for chores, and later charging business cards for meals. Let's consider one parent, and three kids.
:*Let's asume that each kid does one chore, and in exchange Dad gives each of them one business card in exchange. Did Dad do any work to put value into that card? No. The card is in fact an IOU, in exchange for a meal, provided at a later time. When later the meal is provided, and the kid "pays" for it with a business card, the cycle will be complete; Dad will finally have done work in return.
:*Now here is where it gets interesting. Let's say that little Timmy likes to eat more than his share of food. He will need more than one business card. He can do one of two things:
::1 -- He can do more chores, and get more cards from Dad. Or,
::2 -- He can make Marbles and sell them to his other brothers, in exchange for business cards. Why would he want to do that? He's found a real easy way to make marbles, so making marbles is better than doing chores for Dad!
So here is where the trouble begins: Timmy makes marbles, and sells them to his other brothers. But his brothers only have one business card each, remember? so his brothers go to Dad and offer to do more chores in exchange for more business cards. Dad gives each brother one more business card. Each brother goes to Timmy, buys marbles and gives him a business card in exchange. Let's do the accounting:
:*Timmy got one card from Dad, and one from each brother, leaving him with three cards. He gets two meals from Dad, pays two cards, and keeps a profit of one card.
:*Each brother worked for two cards each, and Timmy worked for one card. Dad gave out a total of five cards.
:*Dad supplied FOUR meals, two to Timmy, one each to the other brothers, and got FIVE chores. There is a chore surpluss!
In other words Dad got an extra chore for which he will never have to do anything in return!! This is why the people never ASK for fiat money, it is always IMPOSED on them by the Government. Whenever you have a fiat money system, and the amount of money circulating increases (and it always increases ;-) someone is getting something for nothing..
Dullfig 21:03, 18 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm going to have to think about that one: maybe the analogy wasn't well thought out, because in real life you cannot give money back to the government in exchage for anything. So the fact that Timmy could get an extra meal from Dad, is somewhat different to how it works in real life with the government. Dullfig 18:47, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Fiat Money is a form of Taxation

message: IIRC Marco Polo reported the use of paper money in china, which predates the 19th century first use as mentioned here. Kim Bruning 09:42, 21 Jun 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Paper Money in China 

message: I have removed the linkspam warning template, because there was virtually no linkspam present. I have also removed one of the external links, which linked to a list of articles. If there are linkspam problems, then please discuss them here. Thanks! The Land 18:17, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I have readded thelink that you removed, because although it is a list of articles, it is a list of articles on that site which presents an outlook from many different angles which isn't covered in one article --PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 18:44, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The articles it links to aren't appropriate resources for an encyclopedia, so I've removed it again. I've also removed a spamlink. Hmm, maybe we do need that template back... The Land 11:42, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

text: Well, the 'Jewish view of money' is not referred to anywhere in the article (and I would be surprised if there was anything to write about it), so I don't think the link is 'meaningful and relevant' as per WP:EL. The Land 11:05, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links 

message: Now I am not turning this into a spelling debate, however through this article "checks" are in the majority of use [some cheques have creeped in], however the entry in wikipedia is "cheques".  I would say cheques should be used throughout this article. Opinions?  unsigned
The Wikipedia policy (which I cannot find to cite) is that an article with mostly British spellings should remain that way and the same for American.  So, if this article says "check" do not use "cheque" whatever is used elsewhere in WP.  Paul Beardsell 01:38, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Cheques/Checks

message: Some are POV pushing here.  The article now reads, paraphrasing, that the nasty state coerces us to use their horrible money on pain of persecution.  This is not a universally held view.  Others think that society has clubbed together to put in place structures that many of us want including a central currency.  The article did say the state encourages us to use their money.  This is true for all readers.  Now it says there is coercion.  Arguable.  Not true for all readers.  So I am reverting to the NPOV version.  Paul Beardsell 01:52, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  First of all. happy new year to you and to all of you.  is your POV true for all readers? How this can be? It is not true for me, it is not true for all the readers before you arrived here. Have a look below, the phrase I recently added  "enhanced by a central authority mandating the money's acceptance under penalty of law and demanding this money in payment of taxes or tribute." resides in the second paragraph of the definition. Have you ever read the whole article?  Do you think that all the people that drove the article improvement since 27 March were blind? A poor workman blames 06:14, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: "Encourage" is a superset of "coerce".  Anyone who agrees with "coerce" must also agree with "encourage".  We won't only have anti-state anarchists agreeing with the article.  That's why it's a more NPOV word - becuase it is more Neutral and that is what the N stands for in NPOV.  Paul Beardsell 08:02, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I can point you at countless blinding errors that have existed at WP for ages.  I find a couple every time I care to have a good luck.  Not controversial ones but obvious ones.  Or so they should be.  We seem to be wired to accept anything in print or on screen as gospel truth.  And that is why they must be corrected.  Because readers are not reading the obvious error and identifying it as such.  Shame on those who saw the error and let it stand.  As for what is POV and how to write NPOV material the NPOV article is a good place to start.  And being able to accept another's improvement to text one originally wrote is difficult but necessary if our aim is to have a good, free encyclopedia.  (Alternatively, the ability to explain why the original version is better could be cultivated.)  Paul Beardsell 07:49, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

text: Coersion is somewhat about a point of view. By stating that coersion is not involved you are taking the view of the state. However the reality is that legal tender laws compel people to accept fiat currencies in certain situations. There is a clear difference between encourgagment and coersion. Laws don't encourage people they coerse them for better or worse. Perhaps the word "compel" might be used as it has less sinister overtones. Terjepetersen 05:31, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, I agree, better than coerce.  But Onassi (and others) have been asserting here and elsewhere on WP that the state compels e.g. the use of "legal tender" for the repayment of debt.  Your edit lends credence to that untrue view.  The compulsion, as I see you also understand, is for certain limited purposes only!  (And in the case of "legal tender" the compulsion is usually a compulsion to accept it as a legitimate form of cash in the currency of the specific legal tender, not a compulsion to use it.)  So what the compulsion is needs to be spelt out if the word "compel" is used.  Otherwise the incorrect view that I am wondering around WP correcting, that one MUST USE THE STATE'S CURRENCY IN ALL THINGS, is perpetuated.  Paul Beardsell 08:04, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  First up they were not my edits. I have done some edits on this topic (Money) in the last few days but nothing that relates to the word coerce. My only contribution in so far as coerce is concerned is in this discussion section. Governments do coerce a demand for their currency but less through legal tender laws and more through taxation laws. I think your concern about coerce has more to do with some perceived negative connotation rather than some hightened insight. The government coerces many things in an economy (for better or for worse). Denying the obvious nature of government does not seem very helpful in an encyclopedia article. And in this instance the motivation for your edit seems to be heavily tainted by POV. Terjepetersen 08:22, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You're right, I do have a POV.  However, it may not be what you think!  I'm far less of a statist and much more of a libertarian than you might think.  I cannot help but take a contrary stance against the unqualified assertion that the state coerces or compels us to use its money.  The implication and false conclusion naturally drawn (and this conclusion was drawn at fiat currency and legal tender probably using this article as the authority) from such a statement is that we must use the money for all things and all purposes including the repayment of any loan!  This is not true.  Surely no one here wants to create a false impression?  Paul Beardsell 08:39, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  POV pushing 

message: This article reads extremely POV from the beginning: "since the need arises naturally", "barter is innefficient", etc. It makes no mention of gift economy or other non-money systems and makes no mention of criticism of money.Sumthingweird 15:05, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There is proof that barter IS inefficent out there. xSTRIKEx6864 05:43, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: That shouldn't impact the page unless the proof can be cited. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it), "out there" is not good enough for wikipedia. I don't advocate barter but since there has been so much philosophic and economic criticism of money over the ages, it would seem to me that a Wikipedia article should mention these aspects in order to be balanced and NPOV. The very purpose of money is to keep possessions from people who have not earned them - thus creating wealth discrepancies. Whether you think this is a good thing or not, the facts should not be manipulated to support your POV. Sumthingweird 17:18, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The purpose of money is to keep possessions from people who haven't earned them? It's more accurate to say it allows people to obtain possessions if they earned them. Without the medium of money there would be even less exchange and even more hoarding. Barter can be explained as inefficient as a simple intellectual exercise, you can have more transactions if you agree on some medium of exchange than if you are only able to make exchanges when two people's interests line up. You can criticize the love of money, but it's hard to make a case that money itself isn't the most efficient means of transaction.--BigCow 05:23, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  This isn't exactly the right place to discuss philosophy, the article should reflect referenced facts. The fact is that money has been criticised, and it is missing from this article. Your first statement "it's more accurate to say..." seems to be the same as my quoted statement, except phrased in the positive instead of the negative. Your assumption is that the only way to naturally obtain an object is by earning it, but this is contrary to the historical development of possessions - nobody "earned" air or water or even food, which could be killed and eaten by whoever took the effort to acquire it. The issue of "earning" possessions came with population growth and limiting of supply (as well as increase in life expectations). So if money allows people to obtain possessions if they haven't earned them, and there is a limit of supply, money also keeps possessions from those who have not earned them. I repeat again that I do not support a barter system because I believe that it creates the same problems as money, albeit a little slower. Again, I can't make a case that money isn't the most efficient means of transaction here, because that is an original research argument that has no place in a Wikipedia article, but economists have certainly made the point that money leads to wealth discrepancy. If transaction were not the goal, and rather providing needs were the goal, the argument that money is the most efficient means of transation is meaningless, whether it is true or not. The fact is, money is valuable in our society as it stands at the moment, but historically that has not meant that people have not criticised it. A full article should include this information, whether we agree with it or not. --Sumthingweird 20:18, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Your idea that "money also keeps possessions from those who have not earned them" seems ridiculous to me, but go ahead and add it to the article if you can find a reference for it. Tagging the article with NPOV is definitely overkill. I'll leave it up to the next one who reads this discussion to remove the tag. --CygnusPius 21:58, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  NPOV 

message: I would like to offer new definitions - perhaps inserted in a new section called "Other Definitions"
Currency: That which circulates as a medium of exchange; anything that is in immediate, continuous and widespread use as money.
Money: A psychological creation; a concept; the mental image of that which is used as a medium of exchange.
Taken from the Nesara Institute.
inigmatus 18:21, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  New Definition of Money 

message: I have removed the following para from the article
:Though these private, especially digital, monies has had some modest success, governments have established a coercive monopoly on what currency may be used in lending by enacting legal tender laws. One may borrow a private currency but repay the loan with a legal tender that has subsequently devalued against the private alternative, with the lender being required by law to accept it. This large and apparently insurmountable risk to lenders severely limits the proliferation of private money, as the interest rate would have to be exhorbitant to compensate for this tremendous risk premium.
Assertions like this pop up again and again on Wikipedia from the same editor.  Others and I have succeeded in removing these and similar assertions from legal tender and fiat currency and elsewhere:  It is not true that loans can only be made in a "legal tender", nor is it true that repayment of a loan must be accepted if the repayment is offered in "legal tender".  If I loan you a bag of potatoes (or a bar of gold) then repayment must be in potatoes (or gold).  Essentially the challenge is this:  References required!
Paul Beardsell 14:48, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  questionable "exclusive legal tender for loans" para 

message: Why is standard of deferred payments regarded as essentially different from unit of account? And why is it relevant to the definition of money? Surely a "standard" is a benchmark or measure and that concept is adequately covered within the defition for a unit of account. Terjepetersen 11:44, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  standard of deferred payments