July 10, 2009
If I Have One Dollar
by John Michael Gorrindo
If I have one dollar, and you, 67 cents, we can compare:
You have 2/3 of my sum.
I have 1 1/2 times yours.
Or, if you prefer percentages:
You have 33% less than me.
And I have 50% more than you.
It is no wonder the rich feel less rich in comparison to the poor than the poor would like to think, and the poor feel poorer in comparison to the rich than the rich would otherwise figure.
Now YOU go figure; do the math. Numbers don't lie. Only people do.
I think that sums up the psychology of money as expressed in monetary comparisons.
I think that sums up why the rich don't understand the poor, and the poor are jealous of the rich, as well.
The fact that it takes money to make money takes us to the next level of dismal perspectives.
If you are able to save money, you will eventually be able to earn passive income from investments. Then your money works for you, and not the other way around.
If you are never able to save money, than you will always have to rely on actively earning it.
It was my understanding that active participation in the economy equated hard work, which led to success.
So success obviously means reaching a level of passivity, i.e. incompetence.
Those who truly have it sussed are those who have reached their level of incompetence. They deliver their livelihood into the hands of capitalist system, becoming passive in the process.
But is this a bad system? Some say people are not bad, only the system. So to take advantage of a bad system- does that turn us from good to bad people?
Apparently not. It just makes one rich, not bad.
To judge is not a terribly attractive pastime. It just angers the blood. Anger is not in vogue.
Accepting the nature of things seems a lot more attractive. Especially if one is rich.
Suddenly one can afford to become a man or woman of principle. If one can rest on their money, they can rest on principle as well.
Suddenly, morality can take on appropriate role in life.
If one is poor, morality gets in the way of survival. It's quite unmerciful to condemn a man for stealing in order to feed his family.
Is this kind of theft immoral? Probably not, though each case should be looked at individually.
But who has the time?
No, it's better just to say the poor who steal to survive are amoral, not immoral.
But don’t feel too bad about this- there are some great benefits to being amoral.
For one thing, one will never be a boring kind of person. Principled people are both boorish and boring.
In fact, I'm a most interesting and original person. So are my legions of poor acquaintances.
But as for the rich- well, I have always known them, too.
There is one thing I know about them- the more they have, the more they fear. The more one has, the more one has to lose.
It makes a lot of sense, actually. Who can blame them.
Just do the math.
Reduce your needs, is my unsolicited advice. That is- reduce their cost. Buy on discount whenever the opportunity presents itself.
The discount is the purest form of economic amorality. One steals from yesterday's high prices in order to pay for today's slash in prices.
It's a wonderful system if one can always buy on discount.
Never pay full price. Only people of principle do that, and that is boorish behavior.
Let's do the math again.
If you buy a dollar item for 33% discount, then for the 67 cents you had- it's suddenly worth a dollar. And if the richer man pays full price for that dollar item, your money has suddenly become equivalent to his.
Then neither of you has use to complain or compare.
The poor buy discount in order to survive, and the rich buy at retail in order to retain their status. That is their weakness, if you didn’t know.
But the poor will never have status. Status is less than useless to the poor.
But what they do have is the discount.
The discount is the great equalizer of the world.
Forget about ethics of equality, liberty, and fraternity. The Age of Enlightenment didn't have a clue about the grand metaphor of discount.
We now live in the Age of Walmart. It makes all the interesting people- those who steal- suddenly model citizens and consumers of principle- hence boring.
Never has the world been so boring.
The rich and poor are now completely alike. The discount has conferred equality on everyone.
One can depend on the discount to come to their favorite mall or supermarket for any and every given item sometime during the calendar year.
Life has become utterly predictable. It's only now a matter of keeping an eye out for a particular discount to make its way around the cycle for each and every item sold.
Well- don't complain if passivity is what you'd rather. One has to do a little work in keeping track of things.
Even God has to work on that one.
It's entirely his fault anyway.
Just do the math.
Numbers don't lie. Only people do- and I guess that goes for God, too.