The Wrong Wish

The Wrong Wish
Do you know what is the most common thing people usually wish? It is that they wish they have a lot of money. Well, fair enough isn't it. Who ever would not wish that kind of thing anyway. A lot of us would wish about it. We would like to say that if only I had a lot of money, I could buy the things I want to buy or the things I need. If I had money, I could date a girl, travel around the world and buy some fansy stuffs. If I had more money, I could go into business or join the stock trading industry. If I had more money, I could enroll to a prestigious university. Everyone wishes to have lots of money and it is inherent in our nature as human beings.

This phenomena is apparent in some of the noon shows in the Philippines. We can see in Wowowee that people who join in their game show wish to have lots of money. Money that they could use for their own with their own reasons behind it. It is also present in Eat Bulaga. We see charismatic personalities who wish to give lots of money to these participants without any burden. They would just ask a very simple and common and general question, even a child who is grade one in the elementary could answer their questions. Some game shows give money by using your luck like the Whammy; and a little induction to be used during when the participant would decide whether to continue or not. Either of these game shows mentioned, the idea is they give money to people and it brings joy to them, the giver and the receiver.

This is quite troubling for some people like myself. I say this is the wrong wish. Why can't we wish that commodities, goods and services will become cheaper so that despite we have few money in our pockets, we could still buy the stuffs that we need and want. This wouldn't sound selfish compare to a wish of having lots of money. Essentially, I am saying that let the value of money increase. We know for a fact that cash like our coins and paper bills will remain the same. Their figure won't change. A hundred peso bill is still a hundred peso bill in the future. But what changes is the value of that one hundred peso bill. Today, a hundred peso is value only at around 40. That's why we have to give more cash when we buy stuffs. And it is so burdensome in our family. I mention family here because it is the basic social and economical status in a nation. We can apparently see the burden when we go down to the family level.

There are many factors that would increase or decrease the value of money. One of which is the policies of our government with regards to inflation and the other is the strategy that suppliers do. We know that the value of our money is everyone's concern. We all want to have a strong value of money so that we our money will have a strong purchasing power. But is it not everyone's task. This is not like global warming/climate change that it is both our concern and task. Environmentalists would say to throw our garbage properly or don't burn plastics. But when we talk about the value of money, yes it is our concern but as individual we can't do anything about it except to our government officials and the producers or suppliers of commodities, goods and services.

Inflation is one of the cause why money value changes. Usually it brings prices up and the purchasing power of money down. Do you know why inflation happens? It is because there are less supply of the all the commodities, goods and services than the demand of these commodities, goods and services. We know in economics that whenever quantity supplied is low and quantity demanded is high, prices increases. So, who are we to blame? Roughly our selves because perhaps we voted the wrong government officials during election. I am saying that, in order to combat inflation we need to have better policies. Some government officials make policies that aren't beneficial to the majority and when it happens, usually it is the consumers who are burden. And what if the consumer has no income? Well, we can't say that he'll die because there are charismatic people who are willing to do humanitarian act to help these people. But in essence, this kind of consumer will eventually die, not physical but socially because he will become attached to the philanthropist. We can blame also the supplier and well, it still boils down to the government for lack of policy impose to these suppliers. Some suppliers go for profiteering in such a way that they intentionally produce low supply in order to gain profits. This is bad again because as I told you, the burden part goes to the consumers. It is not our task to combat inflation but we are roughly the one to be blamed. So, from now on, let's start to be critical in voting our government officials.

There is also a social implication when we wished for lots of money. And that is we become more concern of having more money in order to push a program, dream, goal, etc. It becomes embedded in our heads that we can't work unless we have money instead of properly budgetting our resources. We don't become cost-conscious, instead we keep on spending. We can observe this in the national, regional, local and even school levels. In schools or universities, we see lots of contributions in order to be enrolled. We can see the breakdown of these contributions and we reluctantly pay for it. I appreciate that projects, programs and activities need money in order to become successful, meaning money fuels this things but what I am against about is wanting to have money in order to make successful. And that wanting to have more money to be successful is embedded already in our lives because of our wishful thinking of having lots of money. And I say, that is wrong. We don't need lots of money in order to succeed, instead we just need enough and a better policy and a well-budgetted, cost-conscious and cost-efficient projects, programs and activities.

So, last word, if someone asks you to treat him or her with a cheeseburger, give him or her this response, "yeah, i will when cheeseburger becomes cheaper."

Seems interesting. Yet this is a literature forum and money matters are not discussed at length. Maybe money is central to life and we can not do away with yet it is better it is discussed somewhere else.

Or if you can use money matters framing within literary scaffolds you will do justice here.

Apologize if I am a bit blunt.

What you are asking is the same as having more money:value is after all relative and when one hundred pesos will have a higher value,you will be considered to have more money.Still,you will wish for more,or for lower prices again because it is a natural phenomena,you yourself pointed out.

What you ask for certainly will be achieved one day,but it will come as the result of many economical and political efforts.Such changes have to take place that the progress is faster.But you can’t expect it done in a blink.I say this now because a few days ago I had a very enlightening conversation with my cousin’s father.He works in a bank and devises systems and equations to make it all work:this is also done by millions of other people that work with finances.If there is one small unexpected change in this sytem,it all collapses and all these million of people should try very hard to rearrange it,if they ever make it.Certainly,this system is subject to changes,but only when social and financial factors are right and syncronised.You know,there are people,children mostly,all around the world that starve each day,each minute,each second.Once in every three seconds a child dies in Africa.One…Two…Three…There you are…It feels horribly bad,doesn’t it?So,unless we are all considered equal,you can’t really expect dramatic changes.Every progress in economy has come after a bit more of social equality,so…imagine it yourself.But if I go on further,I would start dwelling in the areas of politics and philosophy.There is one system that tried to do what you are talking about:communism.But it failed,since those financial and social factors weren’t ready and sicronised:communism was turned into a harsh dictature.

You are most certainly within your right to complain and ask for things done.But you know what?Ghandi once said:”You must be the change you want to see in the world”.So start working for it…Write,get educated in a way such as to give wonderful arguments on your cause,protest,sing,dance,travel…Anything that you can find which can be used as a means to make your voice heard.Because,in the end,I agree with blazeofglory in the fact that this is a literature forum that can go as much as philosophy.Here it’s kind of more poetic than the pragmatist money talk…But you are on the right way to be heard,however…

In fact I am also interested in money matters, that is business and economics. I write and post for the business forum and here I find business matters a little not germane to the context.

Yet if someone comes up with ideas, amalgamating two diverse disciplines and subjects of polar opposites I become thrilled at the prospects of enjoying both at the same time.

After all everything is correlated and for that matter coexists. Businesspersons can be interested in literature and if something can serve both purposes at the same time it will be amazing.

At the same time literature has to do more with styles and if business communications are made in a very mellifluous language and if it can touch the reader with the beauty[HTML] of[/TML] the language and style I feel there is a conflation of both, literature and business into a beauty.

Money is inevitably vital and admirable for this century,I am exuberant with it.Devoid of much money would begets headache problems so on ad infinitum.But money is what we attain in the aftermath of studying,so I am working on it.It is foolhardy to negotiate too much of money,as money-the discernible and cliche word,riled people.Thereby,let's earn what we can.

The Jungle, by Upton Sinclair is a good read if you are interested...

I think money should only be thought of as a means to an end- example- i am hungry, money will buy me food, ergo, money is food.
money is shelter
etc.

When one begins to love money for it's own sake (RE: the act of attaining large amounts of money for no inherent purpose) then that person perhaps suffers from an affliction of the psyche, and therefore, is susceptible to corruption.

In short, I have a tendency to view money as a necessary evil.