While at beach wasting the day away with a hand full of sand, the wind quickly carries it through the slips of the fingers, and away with the wind before there was ever the opportunity to glance at it. This in the eyes of many is the harsh concept of money. What is money and the concept behind it? This is a major question for everyone around the world. As the famous “Stone Money” story stated, money is an item worth value for trade. In order to further explain the concept of money, we will look into how the US currency differs from the Yap’s and the public’s faith in the value of currency.

Between the United States and the Yap’s, each had a similarity with the concept of money. Each used a significant item for value for trade, but what makes an item valuable? Each nation has its own unique and interesting way of trading currency. The Yap’s may have had the most intriguing of them all, giant carved stone. With the hard work and labor to create such an item it therefore had significant value. These stones had huge structures that soon raised questions on how each individual would possess such an item, or even transport it. Quickly enough, the Yap’s soon stopped the transportation of huge stones and rather turned it into property. An individual could leave the stone wherever, knowing that he is the sole owner of that stone. This concept works hand-in-hand with the system of US currency. In today’s society, we have bank accounts with simply a number and as we spend “money”, the simple digits switch around. Although that money is not currently one our person, we still own it. With such an influence, the US adapted this similar concept.

How much faith does one have in the value of currency? After the gold standard was eliminated, the only faith we have in currency is the faith in our government and their power to manipulate us into believing such a thing. The US dollar bill is nothing more than a thing worthless piece of paper labeled by a number, but yet again it is suppose to be worth a whole lot more. How is something so worthless able to be traded for a new car, a laptop, or even education on how our faith in money could be distraught? We work days on end to earn such a thing but yet we are still seeking the faith behind this concept. The only reason we believe this concept is because it is the ONLY true way to make a living. We are forced upon believing that such a worthless piece of paper isn’t so worthless after all. The public’s faith in the value of currency is only present because it is the only trading system that we are able to engage in.

Cows and Chips:

The beach is often a popular vacation destination on the East Coast. One of the many popular activities for children on the beach is building sand castles, but how long do those sand castles last? The cool, calm waves creep up and wash away each and every sand castle before we know it. They come and go just as quick as money does. We slave to build a sand castle that is something worth while just to see it dissappear shortly after and we are left to build it again. This is the same way with money. We work extremely hard to earn something that we instantly spend and we are left to continue working to earn more money. This in the eyes of many is the harsh concept of money. Many questions that arise is what is money and the concept behind it? This is a major question for everyone around the world. As the famous “Stone Money” story stated, money is an item worth value for trade. In order to further explain the concept of money, we will look into how the US currency differs from the Yap’s and the public’s faith in the value of currency.

Works Cited

http://dailyreckoning.com/the-real-reason-the-u-s-dollar-has-value/

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/16/us/politics/the-fiscal-cliff-explained.html?_r=0

http://www.ushistory.org/us/48.asp

If someone had asked me several days ago what I thought money was, I would have regurgitated some textbook definition like “money is a form of currency to be exchanged for goods and/or services.” The reality is that most people, including myself, fail to consider the true logic and science behind the concept of currency.

The idea of trading things in exchange for other things has been around since the beginning of time because we’re simply a greedy species. How many times has someone asked you for something and one of your thoughts is “what am I getting out of this?” When America’s economy was first established, it was a small farming economy run by the colonies and over seen by Great Britain. Now, we have the nominally largest economy in the world. Most history books will tell you that our economy was built by hard-working Americans in hope of building a better life. In reality, our economy was built on faith. Banknotes were introduced in 1861 as a way to help finance the civil war. Basically a place holder for things of intrinsic value, they served as an investment in the U.S. Government to help support the war effort. These investments were made in good faith that the banknotes could be exchanged for their worth in something of real tangible value i.e. gold, silver, copper, etc.

Most countries have their own form of monetary system, some more exotic than others. Perhaps one of the most intriguing examples I’ve been introduced to is that of the island of Yap. The Yapese people trade coins of their own design. The coins vary in size, ranging from seven centimeters to nearly four meters in diameter. The larger of the bunch are often too heavy to move so they stay in one place for the long durations of time. Much like our economy, that of the Yapese people is built on faith. Rather than physically hand over their coins in exchange for the things they want, they simply transfer ownership. When a coin is too large to move, it remains stationary but everyone is made aware of who owns that coin. The coin itself has no value. Take the coin from the island of Yap and you’ve simply got a big rock. However, that’s where the faith of the Yapese comes into play. On the island, the great boulders of limestone are considered valuable because they are hard to come by and once cleaned and polished they’re quite beautiful. They hold value because people want them and that’s really all any financial system boils down to.

Modern currency was invented because it is far easier to regulate than just trading goods and services, which usually have immediate benefits but the value varies depending on the people involved. Common currency is also far more universal. If you can only exchange a certain item or service but no one wants it then you’re going to have a very difficult time generating any revenue. However, if the currency you use is more widely accepted you’ll be able to market to a wider audience.

My question is simply who gets to decide what has value and what doesn’t? The inhabitants of Yap found these large chunks of limestone and so admired and wanted after these rare pieces that it became their currency, regardless of what the rock itself can do for anyone. American dollar bills are representative of precious metals and other valuables but why are those the things we consider valuable? What good is a chunk of gold when I’m sick or hungry? It can’t help me unless I exchange it for something else. Now we must ask ourselves, “How different are we from the Yapese from anyone else?” This produces a “which came first” conversation. Do we want money because it’s valuable or is it valuable because we want it?

Frankly, I don’t know enough about how these systems are developed to form a firm opinion on how it’s all carried out. However, I do know I’ll have some new thoughts the next time I swipe my debit card or go fishing for spare dollar bills in the bottom of my bag.

Works Cited

Bellis, M. (n.d.). The History of Money. Retrieved September 13, 2016, from http://inventors.about.com/od/mstartinventions/a/money.htm

In a society where monetary payment is the one thing that is asked of individuals in return for their acquisition of goods and utilization of services, it can be argued that sooner or later those individuals will eventually develop a desire, if only strictly need-based, to get their hands on as much money as circumstantially possible in order to provide for themselves in terms of both everyday necessity and, if fortunate enough, materialistic desire. The United States is a perfect example of a nation in which the above claim might hold true, except for one major flaw; most Americans, be they impoverished, wealthy, or somewhere in between, rarely “get their hands on” the full extent of the wealth they believe lies in their possession, or physically see the stacks of bills they understand are sitting in a vault somewhere with their names on them. In today’s society the dollar, a rectangular piece of cotton fiber and linen that was once used to represent the value of a certain amount of gold, is no longer backed by any commodity or resource of worth. As NPR News’ Jacob Goldstein would argue, money is nothing but fiction, and the dollar is only worth something as long as the federal government says it is; the fictional quality of money is inherent in the very idea of money, in any system of currency, no matter how simple it may be.  

For centuries the Islanders of Yap, which is the “most westerly” of Micronesia’s Caroline Islands, have used a system of currency that is far less complex and sophisticated than the one Americans are accustomed to today. According to William Henry Furness III, an American anthropologist who spent several months living amongst the natives of Yap in 1903 and who wrote a book detailing the customs of its people titled The Island of Stone Money: Uap of the Carolines, their currency is called “fei, and it consists of large, solid, thick, stone wheels, ranging in diameter from a foot to twelve feet, having in the centre a hole varying in size with the diameter of the stone, wherein a pole may be inserted sufficiently large and strong to bear the weight and facilitate transportation.” Along with the physical peculiarity and impracticality of the fei, which can individually outweigh a car, Furness noted other interesting characteristics of the stone currency, including that it is not actually necessary for the owner of fei to physically possess their limestone money to claim it belongs to them. He wrote that after “concluding a bargain which involves the price of a fei too large to be conveniently moved, its new owner is quite content to accept the bare acknowledgment of ownership and without so much as a mark to indicate the exchange, the coin remains undisturbed on the former owner’s premises.” To further illustrate the culture’s strange concept of monetary ownership, Furness retold in his book a strange story he heard on the island that involved an enormous fei of incomparable quality and value that, supposedly, was lost at sea by the same men who crafted it.

As the story goes according to Furness, these men encountered a violent storm while sailing back from this particular fei’s island of origin (limestone cannot be found anywhere on Yap), and were left with no choice but to untie the immense piece of stone from their rudimentary raft in order to stay afloat. When they returned home empty handed, “they all testified that their fei was of magnificent proportions and of extraordinary quality, and… it was universally conceded…that the mere accident… ought not to affect its marketable value, since it was all chipped out in proper form.” This event occurred decades before Furness visited Yap, however the man who told him the story assured him that the descendants of the same men who lost the fei to the depths of the ocean were still rich because of that very stone; the family’s wealth remained unquestioned and was known to everyone on the island, almost as if the limestone was “leaning visibly against the side of the owner’s house” for all to see.

The story above along with other bits and pieces of Furness’ book can be found within the first chapter of an essay written in 1991, also titled “The Island of Stone Money,” by a man named Milton Friedman. In this essay Friedman reveals to his audience that his initial reaction to the story above was: “How silly. How can people be so illogical?” He makes the assumption that his audience will react in the same way he did, and in my case his assumption held true because I found myself thinking the exact same thing about the Islanders of Yap. However, when I stopped reading and seriously considered how strongly the islander’s currency system relies on their own faith in abstract concepts, such as the unquestioned purchasing power of a stone lying at the bottom of the ocean that never even made it back to Yap, I realized that Americans in the present day are really no different than those islanders. In today’s society we almost never see the monetary income we earn from the jobs we work; the only compensation most people receive for their efforts in the workplace is a growing number on their monthly bank account statements, a figure that soon falls when it comes time to make regular bill payments online and through the mail. These changing digits on computer screens and pieces of paper are meant to represent tangible dollars changing hands from one individual or entity to the other, yet in reality nothing is actually changing in the physical world. If this is not a perfect illustration of unwavering faith in abstract financial concepts then I do not know what is.

My point is, whether you’re an Islander of Yap buying a house with limestone or a middle class American paying for airplane tickets online, the fiction that is money is apparent in all systems of currency and finance. According to AFP News’ journalist Anne Renaut, there is now a type of digital “e-money” in existence “that is made of strings of dazzlingly complex code created by raw computing power.” This impressive and complex computer currency was developed in 2009 and has soared in value since, however it is still considered “a very uncertain, speculative venture” to invest in as reported within Renaut’s article “The bubble bursts on e-currency Bitcoin” because it is not backed by a commodity, providing further evidence for my argument that the value and worth smoney is often nothing more than a figment mankind’s imagination. Not even the American dollar is backed by a scarce commodity or resource anymore, and the cotton fiber and linen that makes the fabric of our greenbacks has practically no intrinsic value, making our tangible currency as well as the ink on paper checks that often represents it worth only what people are willing to trade for that currency. On any given day a food vendor on the street might be willing to trade one bag of chips for a dollar bill, and on that same day a different food vendor down the road might be willing to trade two bags of chips for that same dollar, indicating that our currency is only worth the most we can possibly get in return for handing it over to others. I believe that deep down most people understand that money is just a fairy tale, a fiction that keeps the economy going; my own concept of money did not change much at all after doing research for this assignment, the only thing that did was my previously unquestioned belief in its worth through the eyes of society.

Works Cited

Friedman, Milton. “The Island of Stone Money.” Diss. Hoover Institution, Stanford University , 1991.

“The Invention of Stone Money.” 423: The Invention of Stone Money. This Is American Life, WBEZ. Chicago . 7 Jan. 2011.

Furness, William Henry. The Island of Stone Money: Uap of the Carolines. N.p.: J.B. Lippincott, 1910. Print.

Renaut, Anne. “The Bubble Bursts on E-currency Bitcoin.” Yahoo! News. Yahoo!, 13 Apr. 2013. Web. 23 Oct. 2016.

Money today seems to be what is most important to people. In this generation “Money is power”. Once before I believed that money was everything. I use to think that all i needed was money to make it in this world and that my happiness would fall into place as long as I had money in my pocket. As I got older I have come to realize that money is  not everything. There is a lot of things in this world that money can not buy but will still make you happy.

After reading “Stone Money “, my thoughts on money have not changed. Based on the article came to conclusion that money is not all that important. It is important for certain things that we need to survive and keep us on grid with technology, food, and clothing however there are people who live their lives using as little monies as possible. The text states,”….. as soon as money fails, papers means  nothing anymore.” I agree with this quote because money is not everything that we think it is. If money lost its value then there would be no need for paper especially with the way technology is advancing.

The way the world works today money is the center of it all. Our environment has programmed us to think that we need a lot of money to live a good life or if you don’t have a certain amount of money then you are not going to be successful or obtain true happiness and that is not true. If money was to vanish from this world tomorrow I believe people would go absolutely crazy and wouldn’t know what to do. I am happy that I changed my views on money early on in life and didn’t let money control me.