{"id":16584,"date":"2021-05-07T20:27:26","date_gmt":"2021-05-07T20:27:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ci02828470f0002568"},"modified":"2025-01-29T15:26:56","modified_gmt":"2025-01-29T15:26:56","slug":"bitcoin-changes-perception-of-money","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/culture\/bitcoin-changes-perception-of-money","title":{"rendered":"How Bitcoin Changes Our Perception Of Money"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>

The Root Of All Evil<\/h2>\n

For my entire life, to the best of my memory, I can recall one persistent narrative:<\/p>\n

\u201cFor the love of money is the root of all evil, therefore selfishness must be the seed.\u201d \u2014 M. D. Birmingham (which is a take on the quote from 1 Timothy 6:10).<\/p>\n

In the most recent decade of my time among the living, I have learned how this belief is wildly misguided. Allow me to defend my reasonings why.<\/p>\n

The Ultimate Currency<\/h2>\n

In the grand scheme of things, money has played a massively important role in the development and progress of history. From the use of seashells as a \u201cmoney\u201d to the gold coins of Rome or the first fiat currency \u2014 the jiaozi of the Song Dynasty in China \u2014 to the U.S. dollar today, money has played a pivotal role for humanity.<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

What money has done, what made it so <\/em>revolutionary, was that it allowed our species to give physical form to our time<\/em> and our energy<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Please, take the time<\/em> to consider that thought.<\/p>\n

Time<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The passage of time is one thing that we can never get back. Once it has been spent, there\u2019s no refund. Time is the ultimate currency<\/em>, forever passing without the ability to return to a prior moment: ever passing, ever spent, ultimately and unequivocally finite.<\/p>\n

Whether you go to work every day or you have a hobby that allows you to make a profit from your efforts , you are monetizing your time<\/em> and your effort that was invested into that job or hobby. That\u2019s precisely what a wage or salary represents \u2014 the opportunity cost for your time<\/em>. Every hour that you sacrifice to a job, you make a decision that the time<\/em> you sacrifice is worth the monetary exchange you earn in return.<\/p>\n

Let me make this clear: A wage is a trade, where you determine that your time<\/em> is worth the amount you are being compensated for. Whether that amount seems low or high, that\u2019s something you have to tackle as an individual. But, typically, individuals earn what their time<\/em> is worth in accordance with multiple factors: skill\/capability, specific knowledge, expertise, network connections, wisdom, and so on. All of those qualifications represent an amount of time<\/em> that was invested by the individual. Time<\/em>, again, is the actual currency.<\/p>\n

By giving our time<\/em> an exchangeable vehicle in the form of money, or purchasing power, we made it possible for our species to exchange our own time<\/em> for the time<\/em> of another\u2019s. Where you may spend hours of your day to produce a tool to be used, let\u2019s say an axe, you may then sell this axe to another for money, where you then go and use that money to purchase bread \u2014 which would have required effort on your part to produce yourself (not to mention the time <\/em>and energy required to spend learning, failing and refining the process to produce said good).<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

Love For Money<\/h2>\n

So, I propose a \u2026 philosophical, maybe even spiritual question:<\/p>\n

If money is \u201cthe root of all evil,\u201d but money is simply a representation of our time<\/em>, what does that make of us and our use of time<\/em>?<\/p>\n

Money is not the root of all evil. Money is a tool just like the axe. A tool is purely neutral; it has no philosophical or moral allegiance.<\/p>\n

Therefore, if money is neutral, then the root of evil has to lie elsewhere, not within the vehicle with which we give our desires physical realization.<\/p>\n

Appreciating money is to appreciate time<\/em> or rather, the appreciation of efficient time<\/em> expenditure. Saving money is to park your expended time<\/em> for a larger purchase at a later date or to allocate funds in case of an unforeseeable expenditure or emergency. Whereas investing money is to sacrifice immediate gratification of a purchase and to risk providing funds to another individual\/group, allowing them to use your money (ergo, time<\/em>) to act out their plans or business, in exchange for a greater return on your initial investment in the future.<\/p>\n

Money is not evil. Money is time<\/em>. What matters is how we choose to spend it.<\/p>\n

Trust<\/h2>\n

Whether you choose to spend your time<\/em>, save it or invest it \u2026 one variable is necessary.<\/p>\n

Trust<\/em>.<\/p>\n

You have to trust<\/em> that your time<\/em> is in good hands, ergo, the money that you choose to measure your time<\/em> in must be free from risk of debasement, seizure, censorship or fraudulence.<\/p>\n

Otherwise, a large portion of your precious time<\/em> must be sacrificed to protecting your funds \u2014 your precious accumulated time<\/em>. Those that rather not spend that time<\/em>, spend the funds to compensate another for strategies and vehicles that protect their purchasing power from the forces of inflation and\/or debasement.<\/p>\n

Enter bitcoin, stage left.<\/p>\n

A force of human ingenuity, bitcoin protects hodlers<\/a>\u2019 time<\/em> by providing a vehicle that is censorship resistant, unseizable, easily transportable, liquid and tradeable globally 24 hours a day, 7 days per week, 365 days per year. No breaks. No CEO. Maintained by the People. <\/p>\n

Maintained by a flotilla of free-agent developers that work night and day, sacrificing their precious time<\/em> to ensure the open-source network continues to provide services that so many across the globe have come to trust<\/em> and compensated by the community (donations made by individuals, organizations and corporations that consider themselves members of the Bitcoin Legion).<\/p>\n

It is of my opinion that if you truly value your time<\/em>, then you must measure your time<\/em> in a money worthy of trust<\/em>. Bitcoin is the most logical vehicle to protect time <\/em>value.<\/p>\n

I trust<\/em> Bitcoin. <\/p>\n

*P.S. Big thanks to Orville, for your input, for being one of my most avid readers, and for being a good friend.<\/em><\/p>\n

This is a guest post by Mike Hobart. Opinions expressed are entirely their own and do not necessarily reflect those of BTC, Inc. or <\/em>Bitcoin Magazine.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The way we traditionally perceive money is, at its root, misguided, as money is what allows humans to experience value.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2686,"featured_media":6605,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[3045],"class_list":{"0":"post-16584","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-culture","8":"tag-perception"},"author_data":{"id":2686,"name":"Mike Hobart","nicename":"mike-hobart","avatar_url":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/image-3-1-1-96x96.png"},"featured_image_url":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/money-printing.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16584","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2686"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16584"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16584\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6605"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}