yeah it's important to understand this
about money a lot of people don't know
money is a measure of wealth money is
not wealth money is like inches dollars
let's say are like inches they are a way
of measuring real wealth which consists
of material resources plus energy plus
intelligence that's wealth money
represents it
and so therefore we don't realize that
as our wealth increases as a result of
an expanded technology we have to
provide enough money to circulate it in
other words we have to pay people for
the work done on their behalf by
machinery because otherwise the
manufacturer won't be able to move the
goods off the shelf now that seems an
outrageous idea frankly in dis accord
with the protestant ethic
you mean give people money where's the
money going to come from
well money never did come from anywhere
it's like asking where do inches come
from it's simply a question of realizing
that technology that was invented to
save labor that doesn't mean in order to
dismiss your employees it means to let
them have a vacation in other words a
shorter work week and for you yourself
as the owner less to do so you can go
and gaze at the moon or make love to
your lady friend and why not do it where
everybody feels guilty about they think
having archaic Minds when we didn't have
this technology that they got to go on
behaving the same way as when machines
didn't exist but now we have them but we
won't use them except in silly ways like
for example rushing around everywhere in
automobiles polluting the air you know
you don't really have to commute in most
businesses if you have a telephone ever
thought about that
you don't need an office
you don't need to go rushing around
exhausting yourself and getting
absolutely furious and the traffic jams
on the freeway you know we're all
getting furious about things we can do
nothing about you know we read the
newspapers and look at TV and see the
disasters occurring all over the world
and feel upset and mad and there's
nothing we can do
why waste your time pick up the
telephone it saves you the cost of a
secretary the fag of mailing stuff
sticking stamps on it going down to the
post office and if you can trap all the
hours you'll realize that the electronic
method of communication that is the
technology is much less expensive than
the ordinary way one goes about things
it's like an automobile is a mechanical
imitation of a horse and carriage
you're completely irrational now I was
referring to the fact that everybody
needs money and while this is the system
while this is the social consensus
everybody doesn't need money but while
it is the social consensus that that's
what we all need let's be frank about it
and not say therefore of the person
whose interest is in higher things
whether it be academic religious or
artistic oh you don't need money because
your satisfaction is surely in doing
your work the only people who need money
that the people who are miserable at
their work their because they're there
to make money let's drop the hypocrisy
the scholar the artist
in this context where everybody has to
have money to live needs money just as
much as everybody else and should be
paid accordingly this applies
particularly to the teacher in the
schools or whatever you know people who
are put down and saying oh you're a
teacher or you're a clergyman you don't
need money because you live on the
spirit
that's rubbish but we are living under
conditions where our money as I have
tried to explain is not understood where
it is not seen for the fiction and the
useful fiction which it is and so what
do we do we have income tax which is the
most absurd system of accounting ever
conceived yeah have you ever figured out
what it costs to pay income tax not just
the tax itself but the cost of paying to
yourself and to the government it's
colossal when I raise the question then
why do it at all why doesn't the
government simply take off the top as
much money as it needs an issue the rest
may be much simpler oh the silly
business that torments everybody would
be canceled and the Department of
Internal Revenue and all its officers
they needn't be frightened of losing
their jobs because they could simply be
the officials who work at the other
direction in other words they could be
the dispensers of the money to everybody
to pay them for the amount of work done
by machinery on their behalf
I mean doesn't that make sense what
we've got against this is not as it were
an intellectual or mathematical bloc but
a psychological block and don't see that
that is the inner meaning of technology
to save labor
and there of course we get into great
metaphysical depths but so far as the
businesses of the matter is concerned I
think what I've said thus far should
commend itself to your careful
consideration
