Interesting treatise on "Real Wealth"

jmski52

Even cohodk and Baley might agree with this one.

http://zerohedge.com/news/2017-09-19/what-real-wealth

From Zerohedge:

What Is Real Wealth?

Authored by Charles Hugh Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,

As for acquiring capital - the most important types of capital don't require much money.

What is real wealth? Money, right? Currency, gold, quatloos, you name it. Money is real wealth because you can use it to buy whatever you want.

I would argue money in any form is only the means to acquire real wealth, which is the agency, opportunity and time to pursue your life's work.

The conventional view that wealth is money and leisure has it all wrong. Let's imagine the owner of a vault of conventional treasure: jewels, gold coins, etc.

If the "wealth" stays in the vault, what's the point of owning this "wealth"? The secret satisfaction of being "wealthy"?

If "wealth" is only an internal state, then let's measure friendship and being needed/wanted as the metrics of "wealth." You see the point; if "wealth" is merely an internal state of satisfaction, then a vault full of "money" is a poor metric.

What money buys that is real wealth is freedom and control of one's life. This control over one's life is called agency. Agency is defined as "the capacity of an actor to act in a given environment." This may not seem like a profound concept, but another way to describe agency is that agency is the opposite of powerlessness.

People with agency define themselves and their identity; they shape the world they inhabit rather than passively await whatever circumstances deliver up.

In the real world, people with agency move on when things no longer work for them in a particular situation. Agency is not just the opposite of feeling powerless; it's also the opposite of victimhood, i.e. the state of being in which others are held responsible for all of one's travails and difficulties.

Agency and responsibility are two sides of the same coin: each manifests the other.

Opportunity is a form of wealth--and so is the wherewithal to take opportunities that arise. Though there is a random element to opportunity--i.e. getting lucky--the wherewithal to take the opportunity is not a matter of luck. It requires a specific appetite for risk, perseverance, the ability to discern how best to use the opportunity, and access to the capital required to exploit the opportunity.

Capital is a type of wealth that isn't limited to "money": Character traits are capital, social networks are capital, experience is capital, knowledge is capital. All of these forms of capital are often more important than "money" capital.

As for "money" buying leisure--leisure in abundance is a disaster for the vast majority of people. Humans are designed to be needed by others, to be part of something greater than themselves, and to gain dignity and pride by doing useful work--whether they are paid "money" for this work or not.

This is why so many of those with the "money" to have endless leisure are miserable. Their lives are an endless treadmill of frivolous consumerism, neurotic pettiness, hypochondria, expressing their infinity of heartaches to counselors, and saddest of all, medications in abundance to relieve the ennui and the dead weight of their purposeless existence.

"Money" is only useful if it is a means to acquire real wealth, which is the agency, opportunity and time to pursue your life's work. There are many people who can spend $600,000 a year on various things (i.e. their "lifestyle") who don't feel "wealthy"--and if they don't have agency and time for work that's meaningful to them, they aren't wealthy: they're as impoverished as the person earning a fraction of their income.

Real wealth doesn't actually require a vast horde of "money." It requires some money, but how much depends on the cost of agency, opportunity and time. For those with few needs and the right priorities, the cost of agency, opportunity and time needn't be all that high.

As for acquiring capital--the most important types of capital don't require much money; determination, self-discipline, organization, a voracious appetite for knowledge and work, an insatiable curiosity, a generous heart, a knack for friendship, the purposeful pursuit of goals-- these are the tools to acquiring real wealth: agency, opportunity and time to fulfill one's life work.

I explain how to amass the most empowering forms of capital in my book Get a Job, Build a Real Career and Defy a Bewildering Economy.

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If you found value in this content, please join me in seeking solutions by becoming a $1/month patron of my work via patreon.com. Check out both of my new books, Inequality and the Collapse of Privilege ($3.95 Kindle, $8.95 print) and Why Our Status Quo Failed and Is Beyond Reform ($3.95 Kindle, $8.95 print, $5.95 audiobook) For more, please visit the OTM essentials website.

cohodk

I've said countless times that knowledge is wealth.

1630Boston

Interesting

Weiss

That is a pretty good read.

musstangr

Links not working for me, but I sure liked what I read there and will be passing this on to my 22 year old.

bigjpst

@cohodk said:
I've said countless times that knowledge is wealth.

But you didn't try and charge us $1 per month or offer your book for sale so how could we take you seriously.

hchcoin

zerohedge.com/news/2017-09-19/what-real-wealth

ricko

Good post.... His book 'Get a Job, Build a Real Career and Defy a Bewildering Economy' is an excellent read, especially for today's young people..... Most do not read books like this though.... ergo our colleges and snowflakes of today. Cheers, RickO

asheland

Great post, very true points made,

Baley

Some great philosophy there, I've always thought of money and pure metals in particular as stored [matterenergytime] that can be released in infinite forms, from "just gettin by" to really Livin it up!

Also satire when he asks us fir a dollar each at the end