Social and Psychological Value of Money - Human Value of Money

Human Value of Money

Money is in the process of acquiring a further value as a symbol and instrument for the conscious evolution of humanity. Society has evolved from earlier stages in which power, knowledge and wealth were concentrated in the hands of a small elite to stages in which education, democratic rights and economic well-being are widely distributed. In the process, the personal power of military rulers has been subordinated to the impersonal power of democratic governments under rule of law and the restricted access to religious knowledge has been disseminated from a priestly class to the wider population. The same transformation is now occurring with regard to economic privileges that were once the purview of a small aristocratic class. As society has come to understand and accept the value of universal education and universal suffrage, it is gradually coming to perceive the value of universal prosperity as well.

Money, which was once the symbol of a privileged elite, is in the process of becoming the symbol of the inherent value of every human being. The recent proliferation of credit cards among large sections of the population in developing countries such as China and India is just one expression of this change. As education and democracy have distributed knowledge and political power to the masses, money – once an instrument for concentration of social power by an elite – is now becoming the instrument for distribution of economic and social power to every citizen. Marx was right in predicting the economic upliftment of the working class, but wrong about the means. Instead of a violent revolution to usurp power, it is coming about through a conscious and voluntary distribution of power by the social collective which realizes that its own best interests are served by this process. Society, which in the past ensured its survival by ensuring the power of a leadership class, is now in the process of elevating the value of every individual to the status of the leader. Money is becoming the symbol and instrument for that evolutionary transition. Money is a human invention intended to serve an evolutionary purpose. Society is in the process of discovering that the original and ultimate value of money arises from the human beings who create it and whom it is intended to serve.