Healthy Money Healthy Planet - library.uniteddiversity.coop

5
Introduction
Aroha is love if you give it away, give it away, give it away
Aroha is love if you give it away, ‘cos it comes right back to you.
It’s just like a magic penny, hold on tight and you won’t get any
Lend it, spend it, give it away, and it comes right back to you.
– New Zealand children’s song
This book is about money. It’s not about how to invest it, or how to earn more,
but about the very concept of money. In it I argue that to halt the seemingly
unending escalation of economic instability, poverty, crime and environmental
problems across the globe, we need a more balanced money system. We need
what I call ‘healthy money’. Moreover, we need to become more aware of our
money system – to enjoy monetary literacy. Just as we design houses and those
houses come to shape our lifestyles, so we create money systems and money
systems shape our societies. Changing the present unsustainable money system
will be a very powerful action to ameliorate much of the damage it is causing.
Why am I writing this book? Because I am seriously concerned about the
impending collapse of the global economy, yet at the same time I want to give
hope. Economic collapse is a frightening possibility, but it is a scenario I believe
we should now take more seriously. It is also a scenario that is increasingly
becoming a frightening reality. In 2001, for example, we witnessed the collapse
of the formerly rich country of Argentina to one where thousands are starving
and 50 per cent of the population is unemployed or underemployed.