Name: Coined
Rating: 3.5 (29 reviews)
Author: Kabir Sehgal

What’s in it for me? An introduction to how money works and why we use it.

As the famous song goes, “Money makes the world go ‘round!”

Almost everything we do daily involves the give or take of cash in some fashion. We work to earn it; we shop to spend it; we save and protect our supply of it.

Yet why exactly do we spend our lives in the thrall of money? What is it that makes it so important?

These blinks will give you a unique look at why cash is king, from its early beginnings to what it’s become in the twenty-first century.

In these blinks you’ll discover

why cash is more valuable than the paper it’s printed on;
why a German can’t distinguish between debt and guilt; and
why money is to a man what pollen is to a bee and a flower.

Money arose as a medium of exchange when communities began to produce surpluses.

Money is a crucial element of survival in the society we've constructed. We use cash as a medium of exchange for getting the things we want or need.

And if you really want to understand money, you first have to understand how it works in the context of the laws of nature.

The nature of exchange is a key concept for all living creatures. Organisms work together to survive, often entering into symbiotic relationships, or symbiosis. In such a relationship, two different organisms benefit each other so that they together can better survive and reproduce.

That's how bees and flowers work. Bees derive energy from the nectar in flowers and then make honey to store through the winter. In turn, they spread pollen from flower to flower, thus fertilizing the flowers and ensuring their survival.

Bees and flowers also exchange electrical energy. Flowers have a “negative” charge and bees a “positive” charge – like magnets, that's why they're attracted to each other. The bees are pulled toward the negatively charged pollen, which then sticks to them so they can easily transport it and pollinate other flowers. Both species benefit equally.

Ancient humans, in contrast, came to realize that they as a group had a better chance of survival if they helped each other.

So humans specialized in different skills and created divisions of labor. Some individuals hunted, while others raised children, for example.

Eventually, humans started producing more food than they could consume. For the first time, they had a surplus that they could trade with other groups for goods they needed. Thus groups began trading technology, such as hand axes or spears.

Over time, humans learned that trade was easier and more effective if there existed a universal tool for exchange, rather than exchanging goods or services themselves – and money was developed.

The way a society prints, uses and understands money reveals a lot about its character.

Money is practical, as it allows us to buy the things we need. Yet it has a symbolic purpose too, in that it can make a statement about the lives we lead and the society we’ve created.

Your opinion on and use of money says a lot about your values, which is why so many people use money to measure success, or failure. Plenty of people work tirelessly to earn as much as they can, only to spend that cash on status symbols such as expensive cars or clothes.

Key ideas in Coined