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Christmas didn't make you broke

How frequently do we criticise ourselves for not having enough money, without realising that this is the inescapable status quo?
We've all heard about the law of supply and demand, and seen it in action: things that are scarce cost more money. Gold, 'Limited Edition' Toyotas (there's an oxymoron) and Justin Bieber concert tickets all cost more than you'd expect ... simply justified by the false economy of demand.

But what gives *money* its intrinsic value? Is it what it enables us to do, or is it the fact that money itself is a product that's in short supply?

If the streets were flowing with money, 'limited' editions wouldn't mean anything - we'd all have the money to afford anything, and then we'd need some new scale to measure the truly rare items in the world with (like hen's teeth and four leaf clovers).

Sometimes it strikes me that everything has been perfectly balanced to keep us on the 'hungry' side of the stuffed/hungry financial equation.

You'll never have enough money, because if you DID, the economic system just couldn't cope (on a systemic global level anyway). As much as we constantly talk about selling as much as possible, if the general population had more money than there are products available for it to spend that money on, the results would be just as disastrous.

Don't feel bad if you look in your bank account around about now and it's not comfortably loaded. It's not (just) you - blame it on the system.
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