It's an arbitrary medium of exchange. Sicarius' comments aside, is that not clear why that would be useful?

Um, to buy things you need and want?

You'd prefer barter? Can you make change for a sheep? Do you want to get paid for your labor in gumballs or 2x4s or fractions of a SUV?

How about we see what we've got and split it evenly between everyone?

That is communism.

The use of money is to repay people in a way that is equal to what you receive. Modern society is accustomed to the use of currency, which is a belief in a piece of paper which means credit. In essence, credit is a lie, but for paper money r coins to be worth something is something you must believe in yourself.

Money is a worldly good. However, where would people be without it?

How will you split it evenly? By cash-value, perhaps?

lubricates the provision of services, because there is confidence in money we are able to confidentally give or recieve goods/services.

You don't need to trust a person on their word because the trust is in the currency they hold. You trust it has value.

It is helpful then in economic systems for money to hold it's value, and for inflation to remain low, as you want also to trust money you are holding will hold it's value, otherwise saving money becomes problematic, and you have to 'save' in some comodity - like gold; which by the way also has value attached to it even though mostly gold is just used decoratively, so it doesn't really matter if you have solid gold or gold plated things, cause they look the same...

It's communism. No kidding.

Communism doesn't work. I think it relies on an optimistic view of human nature, which is unreal.

Not saying that Hobbes is the way to go, but...

Orathaic is going with the mercantile thought about gold

he also summed up what I said very neatly. Thank you.

We don't split things evenly betwen people because people neither need nor want an even share of everything, (be it risk in an enterprise, or specific types of food - if i can't risk building something because everyone would own an equal share in it, and most people don't want to take that risk (and by risk in enterprise i might mean searching for sunken treasure, or running a company to deliver t-shirts ordered on internet websites, or anythign else you can imagine) if everything was owned equally by everyone (and asusming we truely believe in democracy) we'd also have to decide what risks to take democratically, and too much time consulting others would be taken instead of individuals doing what they want and taking the risk on themselves.

Communism doesn't work? What does work?

Democracy does. Maybe.

oh and redcrane, Communism didn't work in Russia, though I don't think it is fair to say it didn't work because of human nature, the history of Russia had a lot to do with how Communism developed in Russia as well. The current regieme may claim to be a democracy but it is still Russia and as when the Tzars rules, Russia is very much controlled by a small group of elites. Whether Communism/Socialism/Marxism/Distributism can work more effectively on certain scales within certain cultures is an unanswered question.

what is the point of money. that's extremely simple, in the barter system we have money because fills the void in questionable trades.

i want 5 chickens. you make me do some work for those chickens.
i want to stay in your home, you make me do chores and work for you.
i do some work for someone, they give me some gold and i turn around and give the gold to you for 5 chickens.

i can see what your getting at. your ethical belfiefs involve everyone having a good life like yourself, i believe in that also. the bad thing is, this is a bad form of communism and with the system we have setup, we have to reward the people who earn big amounts of money.

on the other hand money makes people do crazy things. when i apply for a job, i "white lie" and "act" to get the job over someone who is more qualified. My "need" allows me to consider this ethical because i need the money. Is this ethical?

Is it ethical to "white lie" if your own interests are involved? What about the other applicants? Is it ethical if I'm applying to be a garbageman? what about something truly competetive like a pilot? Is it ethical to falsify credentials so i can get money?

All the ethics involving money, especially in this time period with this recession are difficult to determine. money rules the world.

money can cause hunger, poverty, wars, and depression. it's is like a women, "cold and fickle". it tends to move to whoever has more of it. I wish the government would take all the money from us in america at tax time and deal it out in even amounts every four or five years so it resets the playing field.

one of these days we'll figure out that helping each other is better than money and we'll throw this out of our current system. right now, just try to help anyone you can because money is power.

People need homes, right? So we make sure everyone has a home. People need food. So we make sure people have food. People need entertainment. So we make sure everyone was entertaintment. Same with healthcare and education. Where do we get the people to build the houses, to teach the courses, to be the doctors, to create the games, Tv shows? From the companies dedicated to money like banks and insurance companies.

The scandanavian Socialist model may work; that said if the people in the country don't support the system you're trying to put into place then the system is likely to fail or at least perform less eficiently.

Any system though a pure capitalism which feeds on individuals greed has little way for the individuals to fail it without them first failing themselves. (some might argue that our social system should be to support the individual rather than the individual supporting the system - rather like setting up a game where if you don't play you die, and if you do play you are a slave to the game... i could be seen as rather unfair and inhumane - if you choose to look at it that way.)

@mcraigor: if you think this then you can join a group of like-minded people (there are enough in the US) and work together, sharing and providing for each other (i find it is cheaper to cook one meal for 4 people than 4 meals for 1, and thus i like to share and live communally with some of my friends, there are advantages to living like this, and i think you can do some things as a socialist/communist model would dictate and others as a capitalist/free market model: competing for business, offering the consumer the best value for their money rather than regulating one provider for each service)

@iamfool: yes we need homes and food, and you might like to live in a society where individuals don't look out for themselve on these things (and medical care) and think only of getting the best homes/medical care for themselves; but the free market dictates that the consumer will get the best if we allow individuals make their own decisions about what they want, and companies will try to supply these individuals (In communist Russia everything was centralised and decided by a small committe in moscow, which like under the Tzars left very little freedom to the individual) There are advantages to allowing the markets decide the price of a product (and encouraging bussinesses to be setup to provide goods/services which are in short supply - which requires a supply of credit so individuals can setup these bussinesses - and to encourage competition because a monopoly does not serve the customer's interests) That is not to say I think a completely free market (with only anti-monopoly regulations) is the ideal/best system - but it does have it's merits.

one problem though, this isn't a economics/money market arguement(at least in my case). To me it's an ethics arguement.

my question is: With the current system that we have in America, does it allow actions immoral actions to become ok?

something as simple as a "white lie" on a job interview. I don't hate america or it's systems. i definetly have some crazy questions.

if i make an "hourly wage" which in turn means, a trade of my labor(work) for money; How can i be taxed? I make an agreement with a business, a straight trade. i dont get it. it makes no sense.

And imafool, be realistic (not in a condescending way).

Houses for everyone? Do they deserve it? Maybe they do.
Communism and such relies on a work ethic, that everyone should work the same amount and receive the same amount. It doesn't work like that.

@Imafool before you state a question like that think about what you would do without money.

@redcrane - there are many different things which could be called communism, if a group of people do buy into this idea of a work ethic It is entirely possible for it to work. I might even suggest that democracy can't work in Russia because the people don't believe their leaders will give up power (as demonstrated by their responce to terrorism in Chechnya and their invasion of Georgia). Just because Communism doesn't neccesarily work within one culture/group of people doesn't mean it can't ever work.

As for do they deserve it? Well if you agree with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, then yes. All humans deserve shelter.

Now that may not mean a pent-house apartment, but some-form of dwelling should be provided.

@mcraigor: yes your 'white lie' to get a job become a strategy which all people (in the system) use to 'win' at the game. Obviously there is some checks to prevent people's lies going undetected - using references, but in ANY system humans create there will be some loop-hole which some humans will try to use to get the greatest benifit for themselves (and perhaps those they care about) whether it is lying on an application for federal funding for your school or spending a part of your work expenses to bring your family on holiday.

Also regarding taxation: you trade labour (creating something which is valued by someone in society: be it good/service) and you also live in a society where you believe it is right that some central authority spends money on health care, education, tansport, policing, fire supression, militrary forces to prevent the destruction of your society, and lots of other things.

So you agree to live in this society, which protects certain freedoms, gives you certain rights, and even provides some services to you. (you dopn't have to live there, though i suppose you were born there and didn't get a choice, still let's assume you haven't choosen to live somewhere else) Then you agree that a fair way to provide the money for this central authority is through taxation of your income (at a certain percentage of your income, so those who can afford to will contribute more to those services which your society has decided to provide) I note you also pay a tax when buying a good - we have 21% VAT (Value-Added Tax) in this country, which is added to the cost of all goods we might wish to buy... This is a second tax on the money you have earned when you decide to spend it. In fact as some of your money is then used to pay wages it is again taxed, and the worker who uses it to (at least) buy food will be taxed yet again when he spends his wages...