Money is not Wealth
by Alan Watts
[Listen to Audio!]
 Money is a way of measuring wealth but is not wealth in itself. A chest of gold coins or a fat wallet of bills is of no use whatsoever to a wrecked sailor alone on a raft. He needs real wealth, in the form of a fishing rod, a compass, an outboard motor with gas, and a female companion. But this ingrained and archaic confusion of money with wealth is now the main reason we are not going ahead full tilt with the development of our technological genius for the production of more than adequate food, clothing, housing, and utilities for every person on earth.
It is not going to be at all easy to explain this to the world at large, because mankind has existed for perhaps one million years with relative material scarcity, and it is now roughly a mere one hundred years since the beginning of the industrial revolution. As it was once very difficult to persuade people that the earth is round and that it is in orbit around the sun, or to make it clear that the universe exists in a curved space-time continuum, it may be just as hard to get it through to “common sense” that the virtues of making and saving money are obsolete.
It is an oversimplification to say that this is the result of business valuing profit rather than product, for no one should be expected to do business without the incentive of profit. The actual trouble is that profit is identified entirely with money, as distinct from the real profit of living with dignity and elegance in beautiful surroundings.
To try to correct this irresponsibility by passing laws would be wide of the point, for most of the law has as little relation to life as money to wealth. On the contrary, problems of this kind are aggravated rather than solved by the paperwork of politics and law. What is necessary is at once simpler and more difficult: only that financiers, bankers, and stockholders must turn themselves into real people and ask themselves exactly what they want out of life — in the realization that this strictly practical and hard–nosed question might lead to far more delightful styles of living than those they now pursue. Quite simply and literally, they must come to their senses — for their own personal profit and pleasure.
Latest Community Insights  |
Money is not Wealth
What does wealth mean to you? Can you share a personal experience of a time when you understood the “real profit of living with dignity and elegance in beautiful surroundings”? What do you want out of your life? |
| Kristin Pedemonti wrote: Wealth is so much more the money. Wealth is friends, Wealth is health. Wealth is Experiences that bring you illumination, fulfillment, enjoyment. Wealth is not a big bank account, but rather being ri… |
| Jagdish P Dave wrote: As I was growing up in a poor Hindu family, i knew the difference between money and wealth. Every morning, my mother used to chant in Sanskrit in her melodious voice. I loved sitting besid… |
| Kristin Pedemonti wrote: Namaste and HUGS to you, thank you so much for your thoughtful response and how & what your mother spoke of; powerful. Here’s to us all finding balance and in realizing the inner fulfillmen… |
| Abhishek wrote: To me. economics and our skewed understanding of it is at the heart of our challenges….we have locked up value, as well as our capacity to create it by attaching a ‘price’ to it, while, in fa… |
| david doane wrote: Financially, wealth means having a lot of money. Other than financially, wealth means ‘having’ or being in love, peace, and good health. Dignity is a sense of self worth, recognizing and … |
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Editor’s note: This week, I was lucky enough to meet an inspiring college student who is part of a club on campus that focuses on doing small acts of kindness for others. From giving away chocolates during finals to simply being there for each other, these students are igniting the spirit of compassion and generosity in each other. Check out her personal reflection in this week’s newsletter about a life changing conversation she had on the bus!
