M-O-N-E-Y

Money. Have you ever wonder what money is, really? It's a strange concept if you think about it.

Disclaimer: I have no economic training except for an Agricultural Economics class I took in college. So if I sound like an idiot, that's perhaps because I am.

In the old days, money was valuable in and of itself. Coins were made of gold or silver, copper or electrum. Much later, paper notes were introduced but were still backed by gold or silver, meaning that you could exchange the note for the precious metal.

We then moved off the gold-backed currency (not until Nixon, I think) and today we simply have pieces of paper. Or not. Many financial transactions occur virtually, where paper money never changes hands. Kids today may never see a personal check, or any check for that matter.

I suppose the concept of money is well understood by economists, but not by me. I understand what it is and what it does but how would you explain it to someone, say a visitor from another planet (hypothetically), who had no concept of it.

I heard someone say that money is essentially "canned time." That is, it's a way of trading our time for goods based on the relative value of our time. A brain surgeon's time is worth more economically than a teacher's, so he earns more money per unit time. It's certainly easier than that surgeon trying to barter his skills for needed goods. How many Big Macs do you trade for a sub-dural hematoma?

So nowadays almost all of our money is accounted for on computers- somewhere. Way back, when a thief robbed someone, he needed to get his hands on real goods- things that actually existed. Now, they can sit in their pajamas somewhere (Russia, Nigeria or their mother's basement) and steal you blind. They can pretend to be you without the false mustache and fake accent.

It's a wonderful time to be alive, what with progress and all. You can buy things from all over the world right from your computer screen. You can conduct almost all of your bank related business from home. You can have all of your wealth pilfered without ever seeing the guy who did it.