02-18-2006, 10:12 PM
Trade is not the same as profit. It took me a long time to figure this out. Worse, it was in front of me the whole time, and I didn't see it.
Money is a way for everyone to trade their time, regardless of what their skill or talent is, since all services are necessary for the whole. Profit puts one person at an advantage of another person, thus it is no longer trade. This imbalance results in inflation, since the person who asks for more forces everyone else to ask for more, too. The ripple effect (geometric progression) begins from taking profit, just as much as it does from taking usury.
In modern times, we have now done the same thing to land. At one time land was very abundant and inexpensive, now it has been surveyed and marked on paper and cut into tiny little pieces. Interest causes the land to appreciate, regardless of if the land has any value in creating food, etc. People then want to sell the land for more to cover the interest they paid and to "get even" with all the inflation.
It is a really bizzare thing, but profit makes everyone poorer. But it is not surprising when you think about it. Why would competition be better than cooperation?
Interest greatly distorts the value of land and the marketplace. Franklin wrote an essay on the need for paper currency at age 23 which really became the foundation of the modern world, unfortunately he misdiagnosed the problem, but he was extremely close. His solution (paper currency) extended the ability of everyone to engage in interest. Rather than reducing the problem, it spread it.
A Modest Enquiry into the Nature and Necessity of Paper Currency by Ben Franklin
It's short, and a rather remarkable piece of writing for someone so young in a world of little technology. Obviously people must have been having deep verbal conversations regularly, of which no record exists.
http://www.behappyandfree.com/index.php?op...id=74&Itemid=42