Every once in a while, I’m struck by the fact that money is just paper. This country went off the gold standard for domestic purchases in 1933, and internationally in 1971, so there’s nothing standing behind this paper to give it value. (Not that gold is a more rational thing to believe in than paper. It’s just lumps of metal.)
We all break our backs trying to obtain that paper. We worry about not having enough of that paper. We allow our worst instincts to take over for that paper. Society is so hellbent on subjugating women in this country that women make 16 percent less paper for doing the same job a man does. (That’ll teach us to get out of the kitchen.)
The only thing that gives that paper value is that the government stipulates that it’s legal tender and we choose to believe that. But if, for some reason, enough of us suddenly stopped having faith in that paper, chaos would rule. It wouldn’t be pretty.
Even worse, I can’t remember the last time I even touched that paper. I deal mostly with credit cards and bank transfers and the like. So what I’m believing in, for all intents and purposes, is information that floats around in cyberspace. I can’t touch it with my hands. It will never keep me warm at night. It’s all a mutually agreed upon illusion. What a scary concept.
And the things we exchange this paper for can be equally absurd. An article entitled, “Holiday gift crazes and fads of the past century” reminded me of that fact. We allow advertisers to whip us into a frenzy over some product, and suddenly people are willing to camp outside overnight to be one of the first people to buy this thing that will probably be obsolete or unfashionable in a year. And if it’s Black Friday, those crazed consumers can become an angry mob in no time.
You might be thinking, “This never happens to me,” but do you remember G.I. Joe, or slinkies? No? Before your time? How about Silly Putty or the Magic 8 Ball or Mr. Potato Head? Still no? What about Pez Dispensers or Frisbees or Etch a Sketch or Lite Brite? Easy Bake Ovens? Troll Dolls? Barbie Dolls? Hot Wheels? Rubik’s Cubes? Elmo?
Remember Cabbage Patch Kids? Where did they all go? You had to “adopt” them. Now I bet most of them are in landfills. Shame on us for abandoning something we adopted. No wonder society is circling the drain.
I still see Beanie Babies here and there. Heck, I even have one, a rooster, because I thought it was cute, not because I thought that someday it would make me rich. I even cut the tag off. (Gasp!) But you don’t see Beanie Babies as much as we did back in the day. We have abandoned our beanies, too. Tsk.
Now our tastes seem to have turned more toward electronics. Game consoles. Ipads. The latest smart phone.
And concert tickets are a hoot. You’re trading paper for paper, essentially. And then you trade that paper for entertainment, which is fun, but transient. You don’t get to take Taylor Swift home with you to have her sing you to sleep every night. (And at those prices, that’s not a completely unreasonable expectation.)
The scary thing is that people commit crimes for these things that we’ve traded for paper. You can be murdered for your shoes. Your shoes!
And don’t even get me started about the amount of paper Americans trade for guns and ammo. Maybe that’s why people think thoughts and prayers are sufficient when school children are mowed down as a result. Thoughts and prayers are just as conceptual as paper-with-value. Heaven help us.
I was just reading a New York Times article entitled, “‘Shoot Me Up With a Big One’: The Pain of Matthew Perry’s Last Days” and it was heartbreaking to hear how many people were willing to enable him right to his grave. They could see his downward spiral. They were well aware that he struggled with addiction. They often found him unconscious, or at the very least, unable to speak or move, due to his ketamine abuse. And yet they purchased it for him, forged prescriptions for him, and even injected him. Why? Because he was willing to give them paper.
In fact, those very people (many of whom are now indicted, by the way) price gouged the man. Talk about kicking someone when he’s down. One doctor (yes, I said doctor) actually texted another doctor and said, “I wonder how much this moron will pay.”
Perry wound up paying $55,000 in his last month for vials of ketamine that cost $12 to produce. But it’s all just paper, right? No big deal. Until someone finds you face down in your hot tub, that is. What a waste.
If it’s any comfort at all, this consumer insanity and this placing value on abstractions is nothing new. I’m reminded of the Tulip Craze in Holland that started in 1636 and only lasted a few months before it all fell apart. People were losing their minds over rare tulip bulbs. The most expensive one documented went for 5,000 guilders at a time when the average skilled craftsman earned 300 guilders a year. And in case you missed it, that 5,000 guilders went for One. Single. Bulb. (And if you’re like me, you over water the damned things, and something that should be a perennial becomes an annual.)
I could only find a conversion calculator that went back to the year 1650, but 5,000 guilders is very roughly equivalent to 540,000 USD today. Granted, the average working man did not get caught up in tulip speculation. He didn’t have enough paper to do so, and he had more pressing things to worry about, such as attempting to live past the age of 40. No. This was a game that was only played by the very wealthy. I have little pity for the financial demise of those who already have way too much paper lying around.
I must admit that I was pleased to read an article entitled, “The Real Story Behind the 17th‑Century ‘Tulip Mania’ Financial Crash”. It explained that the entire Dutch economy did not actually get destroyed when the tulip bulb bubble burst (say that 10 times fast), as we have been led to believe. The rich folks were hurting, no doubt. But life actually went on.
The only reason the aftermath of that story got so exaggerated was that until recently, most people based their information on a book entitled, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and The Madness of Crowds by Charles MacKay. He wrote that book in 1852, more than 200 years after the event transpired. And he was basing his information on manuscripts that were lampooning the Dutch for having been so stupid. Also, it’s safe to say, in an age when research was a lot more difficult, MacKay used a lot of hyperbole himself, in order to trade his paper books for paper, uh… paper.
Incidentally, I obtained a digital copy of MacKay’s book for free from Project Gutenberg. I want to read it because it discusses all sorts of mass delusions and obsessions from centuries past. I suspect it might inspire a blog post or two.
Paper. It’s all so irrational. Here’s something to think about: As I write this, women in Sudan are actually having to boil dirt (dirt!) in an attempt to soothe their starving babies. We could surround them with walls of our paper, and due to so many other issues in Sudan, it wouldn’t do these women one bit of good. Suddenly our paper seems as worthless as it ought to be, doesn’t it? What fools we all are.
You have never had to pay to read this blog, Dear Reader, even though I have to pay for the site and I spend entirely too much time writing these posts when I should be doing other things. But how could I insist on having paper pass between us when I do it for the love of writing and for the sense of community it gives me? That’s the value I obtain from this blog. And for that I thank you.
See? I have a moral compass. You’re welcome.
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