Money is not Authentic

In society today, everyone is faced with issues dealing with money in one way or another. Our world is dependent on how much money you have or make in order to live not just a normal life, but a stable life. But to make that climb to make that money can be hard and almost seems like you can’t escape the constant price tag of everything we need to buy. People nowadays think that value and the amount of money they have represents who they are as a person and to the world. But I think it should be very much known that money is not as authentic as it portrays itself in today’s world and how it originated in the world. 

With one of the examples for my argument,  I have a tiny island called Yap which is located in the Pacific Ocean that gives you a great understanding on the value of money and the history of currency. This small island, Yap is believed to be one of the oldest known origins of currency with settlers there buying and trading with the first evidence of money. The way they sold and traded goods was by a big piece of stone or stone money they would call it. This was not for normal day use however, it is shown it would be for expensive things such as a home or a celebration of sorts. The takeaway from the article that is very meaningful was that the value of this stone did not need to be given but it could be sold without it physically there. This resulted in the idea that if people believed it to have value then that was the end result that the stone with or without physical evidence could have a high worth. When you think of how people make money today you tend to think it can’t be fake but you would be wrong as well.

An instance I have of the effects of money is again by NPR talking about “How fake money saved Brazil”. This story goes on to talk about an economist tricking an entire nation into getting out of serious inflation. In Brazil about 20 years ago the inflation in the country was so bad that things in the nation would double in price by the day. It was so bad in fact that if eggs cost 1$ one day, the following month the price of those eggs would go up to 2$. This would result in people becoming poor in this environment struggling even to just eat a meal. Four college kids in Rio thought of a plan to prevent this constant cycle of financial crisis. They thought they should trick people into seeing the value in their money, so they decided to make their own currency for people. The only catch however was that the money is not real at all, in fact fake. They called the URV and said that it was virtual and not real. They changed the national currency to use a URV instead of the cruzeiros which made the value of 1 URV to be higher than the older national dollar. After realizing the URV’s were stable they became national to the country and then changed to “The Real”. With the assistance of the fake currency it was able to get 20 million Brazilian’s out of poverty saving the country from a potentially fatal demise.

Another example that factually represents this argument is the NPR article examining and talking about “The bubble bursts on e-currency Bitcoin”, which is breaking down the first crash of the crypto currency companies as well as mentioning the early rises to this way of future payments. Bitcoin is struggling with their greatest decline in revenue since they began their company in the year 2009 during the beginning of the Global Financial Crisis. The creator and founder of the brand Gavin Andresen , says that he was expecting as they were facing major highs they would gain some “chaos and drama” until the company gains stabilization again. Economics professor Steve Hanke gives a very different approach to the manner saying that the future for bitcoin is uncertain. He mentions the risk of carrying your investments when you have to deal with payments on house or food on the table in your home. They then start to talk about what bitcoin is and how people invested in it carry it on the. They carry it virtually through hard drives as well as in their virtual wallet. The risk that is as well a car ride is the idea of a Ponzi Scheme which is the idea of a pyramid like scheme where people keep recruiting other people so they can make money in return for the people they recruit. It’s a very shady and unpredictable business with many people concerned and wondering what the next steps are for the companies in crypto. Crypto is a high risk and shows that money has a hard time to be proven real because of the way people handle and treat it.

To summarize everything that has been stated already, money should not be taken seriously as some people seem to take it and money itself is not authentic, for example in Yap they used stones as money and trusted others wealth into purchasing and trading goods. In the crypto world some people take it very seriously as others seem it is another way investors can quickly burn their money. However others remain vigilant and optimistic about the future of crypto. The final example as well is the NPR’s on how Brazil escaped the country out of poverty. The idea of how people were able to make a fake currency in order to get out of their situation shows the power of money and how important it is to a person’s ordinary life. With these in mind money would never be authentic when there are too many ways to look at wealth and too many examples of it.

References

Joffe-Walt, C. (2010, October 4). How fake money saved Brazil. NPR. https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2010/10/04/130329523/how-fake-money-saved-brazil 

Goldstein, J., & Kestenbaum, D. (2010, December 10). The island of Stone Money. NPR. https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2011/02/15/131934618/the-island-of-stone-money 

Renaut, A. (2013, April 13). The bubble bursts on e-currency bitcoin. Phys.org. https://phys.org/news/2013-04-e-currency-bitcoin.html Chynoweth, V. (2024, February 1). Future of Energy: How Solar Power is fueling the cryptocurrency boom. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/digital-assets/2024/02/01/future-of-energy-how-solar-power-is-fueling-the-cryptocurrency-boom/?sh=5f2a05f962de