One day I happened to meet an elderly gentleman from Germany that had survived World War II. In the course of the conversation he happened to open his wallet to pull out a well-worn ONE MILLION Deutch Mark note. He said to me, “You know, just after the war, it took a shoebox full of these notes to purchase a single loaf of bread”. He went on, “During the cold German winter people were burning bundles of these notes because it was cheaper to burn them instead of using the notes to buy firewood”. So much for paper currency I said, and he immediately agreed.
What can we learn from this story? Without launching into a dissertation on economics, let us say briefly that printing volumes of paper currency, because its value is so easily manipulated, is outright cheating. Paper currency can be used for many things, you can burn it for warmth if the value plummets, as my freind did, you can stuff your mattress with it, or wipe up a mess, but paper currency has no intrinsic value! Can you eat it if you are hungry? Can you wear it, make a home out of paper? It is only as valuable as governments tell you it is. It will buy the actual necessities of life like food, clothing, and shelter, that is, as long as the money has value, but the actual values of life are not to be found in pretty colored pieces of paper.
Real value, the real necessity of life that we cannot live without begins with food. Human society has advanced considerably over the past fifty years; cellular phones, or satellites orbiting the earth, this was all the stuff of science fiction then. But, with all our so-called progress, technological advancement, we cannot produce a single grain of rice or a drop of milk! So, what is real wealth? Food is wealth and food is money.
The majority of people work all day long, and at the end of the week when payday arrives they are happy to see the fruit of their labor in the form of money earned. What then? They take their hard earned cash to the grocery store and buy the food they need to eat. What if the same persons invested the same energy in producing the food they require? Yes, no more boss, no more taxing commute, no more pressure to perform and be a productive employee unit, and no more stress, and no more pretty pieces of paper. This lifestyle is difficult to conceive of, and maybe more difficult to live, but it can be done in the company of like-minded persons that have the same lifestyle agenda.
Hare Krishna!
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