Money and Corruption

Entertainer Groucho Marx once said, “While money can’t buy happiness, it certainly lets you choose your own form of misery.” In our modern-capitalistic world, money is how people measure success. With money, common daily stresses are nonexistent, and it’s a conventional goal to gain as much as possible within the prime years of life. Some debate, though, that life is not the primary component to happiness. Money is cited as the root of all evil, and I, for one, agree. It can be a competition between coworkers to see who earns more as a human instinct. This peer pressure can be beneficial though, since the person is striving to earn a better life for their family. Despite the drive to work harder, corruption and stealing still occurs in large companies. However, a world without money would be completely different. There would have to be some sort of basis for exchanging goods and services in order to maintain equality during trade. If not, people would desire more and more of a good or service until the system is abused and one person gets the short end of the stick while the other gains an obvious advantage. People buy things they don’t want to impress people they don’t like. Because of trends, those who don’t own a certain product will do a lot just to fit in. Loans for useless items can create so much debt that the person takes another loan to pay back the first. The system takes a lot of effort to overcome, with years of making payments, only to discover more money owed because of interest. Wealth can be defined as not having great possessions, but in having few wants. Nevertheless, money is necessary in life to succeed. A standard education and the needs of survival are crucial, and along with them comes the need for money. In moderation, money is something to be proud of, but once it becomes the most important thing of life, it can consume time and energy that can be better spent somewhere