Open Writing

The human race is the only animal on this planet to use money. Our early ancestors, either as nomads living on what they could find, or as the early cultivators and harvesters on a defined tribal area, managed without it. In modern times, the Jewish communal settlements have not needed it to conduct their internal affairs. People can enter a settlement with nothing, share in its bounty while there, and leave with nothing if they go elsewhere. We follow a similar sequence when we are born, live as part of a community, then die, taking nothing of it with us.

Trade, as we know it, began as simple barter between different tribes when the territory of one tribe could supply goods which were lacking or in short supply in the territory of another tribe. Such trade was limited by the slowness of communication and the small weights of materials which could be carried by people or by tamed animals. Money was invented and, in various forms, used to represent the goods transferred or services given from one tribe to another. It was not needed within the tribe, where the supports of life were distributed according to need.

Invention of the wheel, the steam engine and the telegraph made possible the development of much larger tribes, which we call nations. Further development has now made it possible for the whole of the human race to become one caring and sharing tribe.

We have been hindered from achieving this desirable state by our Great Mistake: our failure to distinguish between wealth and money. The true use of money is to part with it in order to receive the things it represents, or to receive it as a record that we have supplied something to others.

Unfortunately, soon after money was introduced, some learned that those who temporarily had less money than they needed could borrow from those who had a surplus and demand a fee, called interest, for this service. Those shrewd or unscrupulous enough could acquire so much money that they could reap enough as interest to provide for all their needs without working. Numbers of them, by combining their efforts, could hold the rest of the human race to ransom, demanding from borrowers unfairly high interest and imposing conditions of repayment which could not be met.

Money lenders have now become the almost universal landlords. Young people, and even those older, who want land on which to set up a farm or business, have to borrow, and the lenders insist on holding the title to the land until the last repayment is made. Until recent years, when new legislation put an end to such dishonesty, they “re-possessed” the land even if the borrower had met all repayments but the last on time.

To what avail do they accumulate so much money and power, which at their deaths so often becomes dispersed? To prevent this, they have set up what they call the 'global economy', a giant octopus which, through its probing tentacles, the multinationals, intrudes into all nations and seeks to dictate 'laws' which sovereign governments are expected to obey.

The time has come for this Evil Empire, currently based in New York, to be overthrown by the legitimate government in Washington and similar governments throughout the world. The damage caused by tsunamis and other disasters cannot be fixed by throwing money at it. The repair must be done by many people doing the hard and often dangerous work of a caring and sharing 'world tribe'. Moreover, global warming reminds us that, in managing this planet we 'must live as if we will live a day, but farm as if we will farm forever', and forget about 'maximising profits' for the undeserving few.

© Ken Sillcock