The Lottery Bernard Mandeville Greed

Winning the lottery seems like one of the best things to ever happen to anybody. Imagine going from being poor to being a millionaire overnight! That seems like a dream come true, but if you do some research you will soon realize that the lottery actually ruined most people's lives. Why? Because quickly lottery winners realized that the millions of dollars they had received overnight weren't solving all of their problems. They were still unhappy, and becoming even more unhappy. The material items they were buying weren't living up to there commercialized standards. So, they bought more, and more, and more until they didn't have any money left. These people weren't using their money correctly, but carelessly spending it on themselves to find
Greed has been around forever, it is the root of capitalism. Capitalism is “an economic and political system in which a country's trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit, rather than by the state.” (“Capitalism, “ 2002). These private owners have an extreme hunger for money and power, which is where greed came in, in the early eras of time. Until about 1705, greed was not considered the best character trait to have. Bernard Mandeville stated this: private vices yield public benefits. (The Atlantic) Which shocked people. Mandeville was suggesting that before anybody else's needs, came his own, and money was going HIM happy. He did not care what he had to do to get it, and when he got money and power, came all the happiness he could ever dream of. Greed falls under the category of extreme self interest which is a very dangerous place to
With power come riches, and money can do anything in the hands of the beholder. It could be anywhere from donating to charity to paying somebody off to murder someone who has unwillfully wronged them and must be taken down for it. Just because you have power over somebody or you're the CEO of a company does suggest any negative characteristics, but that's when greed comes in. Thomas Aquinas says that “profit knows no limit” (Atlantic). Which is what makes the need for wealth and power such a dangerous thing to pursue. One might also forget that in every situation there will be somebody it's more money and more power. Maybe the left side of their brain is better then yours, so they can do math and science better than