Money1

Blake Bailey
Ian Ritter
Emma Anglin
Camille Ostler
Matthew Steele
English 1010-61
December 8th, 2016
Money Drives Society
While money is a very important aspect to society, it is not the most important thing in
life. Nobody wants to live paycheck to paycheck, and money can help us gain and achieve things
in life that we need, but if we do not pay heed to the little things in life like family, friends,
making other people happy, and finding something we are passionate about we will not be happy
individuals. In our country, we work the longest hours and take the least amount of vacation
time of any industrialized country. The problem in our country is that people are too money
driven because we often associate money with success, happiness, and because our society
worships money and makes us gravitate towards it.
Why has our society become so money driven? In studies done in the 1970s, only 38% of
people said that to have a good life you needed a lot of money vs a study done in the late 1990s
in which 63% of people said a lot of money is necessary for a good life (Levine, par. 3). We can
assume that that number has only increased since then. We asked a few people the question, Did
you choose your career because it was something you wanted to do, or because you would make
a lot of money doing it? Out of five people, only two of them chose their career because it was a
job that would make them happy. The three people that said they only chose their career for the

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money were a doctor, a dentist and an attorney. After the attorney gave me his answer to the
survey question, he proceeded to tell me that if he could go back in time and choose a career
based on interest and not money he would have chosen something completely different. He also
mentioned that at first, the job wasnt too bad and the money was great, but he soon realized he
didnt love his job like he thought he would (Anonymous. Survey. 30 November 2016). If more
people understood this, then people would hopefully choose a career based on interest and
something that would make them happy throughout their whole life, not just for a short time. A
clinical psychologist, who wrote the article How America's Obsession With Money Deadens
Us, stated that the vast majority of his patients come to him due to money problems causing
depression, panic attacks, alcohol abuse, and other problems. In 1900 only 1% of Americans
were invested in the stock market; Now over half the country is (Levine, par. 6). By no means is
people investing in stocks a bad thing, in fact it's a good thing that helps everybody, but it does
show how much our lust for money has increased since 1900.
Having a mindset that revolves only around money makes you miss out on the things that
mean most; spending time with family and friends or doing things that positively impact others.
In a recent study done by the IDFA, money issues was found to be the 3rd leading cause of
divorce effecting a stunning 22% of divorces (CDFA, par. 1). Divorce causes children to be
raised in broken homes which can cause them to be unsuccesful in life, it can make spouses
depressed, and causes many more problems. If people were not so motivated by money, families
would be together and people would be happier. Job stress is a major cause of depression in the
world. 69% of employees report that their job is a leading cause of their stress (Fermin, section
10). 51% of workers said they were less productive because of stress (Fermin, section 11). Loss
of productivity alone costs the US over $51 billion (Mental Health America, par. 1). Depression

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often times leads to chronic diseases such as heart attacks, cancer, strokes, diabetes and many
more. Chronic diseases, that are oftentimes caused by depression(that can be caused by stressful
jobs), cost the US 75% of its $2 trillion health care budget (Fermin, section 16). If people chose
jobs they were passionate about and enjoyed they would be happier, more healthy, less of a
liability to the economy, and would cost businesses less.
We live in a society where everybody is trying to get your money. Everywhere you go
someones trying to get into your wallet. This causes lots of people to scam and rip people off
just for easy money. Scamming and ripping people off is not a redeeming quality. In December
2008, Bernie Madoff arrange one of the biggest fraudulent schemes in U.S. history. Before being
sentenced to 150 years in prison, Bernie was a well-known financier. He persuaded thousands of
his investors to give him access their savings accounts and they would get ongoing dividends in
return, he started running out of investors and couldnt pay out. Our society is oftentimes so
lustful for money that companies, small businesses, and individuals will do anything for your
money. If people would ignore their selfish, money-thirsty side and give the best product they
can possibly give and look out for the best possible scenario for individuals; not only is that
being more successful by positively impacting people, but also in the long run making
themselves even more financially successful by having a credible company and having people
give positivity towards the company.
What has caused our society to be so money driven? The main reason our society has
become so money driven is because we associate money with success far too often. In our
society a person who has more money than the other is labeled as more successful, regardless of
what their family life is like, how they make other people feel, and what they are doing to help

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better society. We believe that having a nice car, nice clothes, and a nice house will make us
more successful than having a good family and impacting society in a more positive way.
One reason to why humans associate money with success is that it can fulfill our needs.
In 1943 Abraham Maslow, an American psychologist, created a concept called Maslows
hierarchy of needs. His theory suggests that, as humans, we go through life with five
unconscious needs that he displays
in a pyramid (Maslows Hierarchy
of Needs- photo to the right). We
start at the bottom of the pyramid
with our basic needs and as we
overcome each level of desire, we
make our way up to psychological
needs and later on to self-fulfillment
needs. In order to progress to selffulfillment, Maslow says we must first conquer the four needs below it. So what does this have
to do with success linked to money? According to our society, money can effortlessly achieve the
first two levels of hierarchy and contribute to the third and fourth levels as well. We ally success
with moving forward (moving to the top of the pyramid). Therefore, when we are standing still
we are labeled as unsuccessful (McLeod).
We also associate money with happiness. We have a mindset that money can get us all
these materialistic things which makes us overlook the little things. We often skip gaining the
things that truly matter in life in an attempt to gain power and materialistic things. Of course
money can help you get closer to an enjoyable life, but you can have a good life without having

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loads of money. Some studies, like the interviews we conducted, have shown that poorer people
are more happy than those who are rich. We often see these rich celebrities on camera being so
happy, but we do not see what they are dealing with behind the scenes. For example, the famous
actress Marilyn Monroe surprisingly had a very sad life. Monroe suffered from many
psychological issues because she felt it was too hard to deal with the fame and fortune that her
life brought her. She had a net worth of $27 million, so you would think that she had an overall
happy life, but for the most part she didnt. She suffered from many different things in her life, it
made all the fame and money not fun for her. A lot of times having a lot of money can cause
more harm than good (Greenman, par. 6). We also see money as the driving force for what job
people want to have. Being so money driven might force us into jobs which will make us
unhappy. We focus so much on what a salary looks like and not what the job conditions are.
There is a correlation between income and happiness, but in reality money buys less happiness
than people think. Money can only buy so much happiness but it stops at some point and that
point comes sooner than people think. People are going to be much happier going to a job they
like than dreading going to work everyday even if that means having a fat paycheck at the end of
the year. In a shocking Forbes study done, only 30% of workers enjoy their job, and the US has
some of the best statistics in the world in that category(Adams, par. 13). To put that into
perspective in China only 6% of people were happy in their job(Adams, par. 10). From a global
standpoint 87% of people were emotionally disconnected from their jobs(Adams, par. 6). If a
person has a job where they do have a large income then they could do things with that money
that could make them happy like donating to charity. Generally people who have high paying
jobs are living a good lifestyle so why not make someone elses life better and in return make
their own lives better. If people were not so stingy with their money and they did something good

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with what they have, they could be very happy knowing that they are making someone elses life
just a little bit better (MacMillan, whole article).
Another reason we gravitate towards money is the environment we live in. Everywhere
we go we are being constantly bombarded with advertisements, name brands, celebrities,
professional athletes, fancy cars, big houses, etc. Having all these things bombard us on a daily
basis makes us want them. When we think of money we associate it with these materialistic
things which we think will make our lives better. Its not as flashy and cool in our society to
admire happy families, good friends, and people being passionate about something in life than it
is to admire the things we see on billboards and advertisements.
So how do we fix the problem? As a group we have looked at other ways the world has
tried to fix the money driven problem. An indirect fix to the problem that has been tried is
communism. Communism looks great on paper as it works to eliminate social classes and
promote equality. Communism is an indirect fix to a money driven society because an absence of
social classes drives people away from a money driven mindset. Sadly, most structures of
communism fail or turn into a dictatorship such as Cuba, China, North Korea, and others (Pipes).
It has been proven by history that government taking control of people's property, businesses,
and money is a complete failure. Communism has lead the the death and misery of billions of
people. In the 20th century alone Communism has lead to the death of nearly 94 million people
(Walters, par. 1). While we know money was not the number 1 motive behind communist
regimes; communism does show us that directly taking people's wealth and having the
government control it does not work, it is about changing people's values and priorities. There
isnt a fiscal policy that a government can implement to fix peoples lust for money.

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Some lesser extremes that have been done to address the problem are looking to art,
religion, music etc. to find happiness rather than looking to money. People will look to art to
create beautiful images that can lead to a sense of allure. People look to religion giving them a
sense of belief that money is only temporary and therefore should not run our lives. People look
to music for happiness because it can make them feel something. Sounds like the perfect fix,
right? Wrong. Although, the thought of looking aside from money to find happiness is an ideal
thought, the reality of the situation is counterfeit. As mentioned earlier, as a society we have a
mindset that money can get us all these materialistic things which makes us overlook the things
which are intangible.
After looking at the not so successful steps that have already been taken to fix the
problem we have decided to come up with a long term and short term solution of our own. Our
short term goal is to get outsiders to think of the problem the way we are. In order to do that we
must first get people to notice the problem. As a group we decided that the best way to get people
to notice the problem was through money itself. As humans, whenever we see stray money it
draws our attention and we usually pick it up. That being said we made a flier which conveyed
the look of an actual dollar bill in hopes that it would draw people's attention. On the front of the
bill there is a speech bubble with the phrase, WARNING: I do not buy happiness and on the
back there are statistics and perks about choosing a career that's right for you. The statistic and
writing on the back will, in hopes, get readers to evaluate the career they choose to pursue and
guide them to one that will make them internally happy even if they don't have external sources
of happiness. If we get people thinking about this problem their values will change and as a
result a domino effect will start and people around them will do the same thing.

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Our long term goal is to change the worlds view on money and the happiness it
supposedly brings. Given that it is practically impossible to change the way the world thinks as a
whole, we have decided that the best way to address the problem of the world being too money
driven is to educate people early on. We learn a lot in high school but what the instructors don't
teach us is how to make it on our own. As a group we thought it would be beneficial to those
contemplating their futures to have a required course in highschool on life planning (this course
can take the place of an elective class). The curriculum would include personality tests and trials
of various skills which would allow students to explore employment that is fitting for their
interests and careers they possibly haven't thought about. These classes would help to drive
students to a career that their happiness would have interest in rather than just their wallet.
Choosing a career based on happiness would lead society away from its money driven attitude
and into a nirvana seeking one.
Society is money driven because life in the 21st century has been glamorized by the
media, TV, magazines, movies that all showcase the good life and we picture ourselves in that
life- Beyonce, the Kardashians and Donald Trump live the life we think we want yet our parents
and grandparents long for the simple life. They made do with what they had and the whole
family pitched in, they didnt get a new car every other year, they bought one house paid it off
and passed it on to their kids. Christmas and birthdays weren't big productions that take months
of planning. Its a vicious cycle that's hard to break what we want is more than what we need.
Theres more to life than working a job we dont like, receiving a big paycheck and living the life
that were shown through advertisements and the media. Focusing on our own happiness, family,
friends, our interests, and passions will make us and society happier, healthier, and more
successful.

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Works Cited
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s Web. 14 Nov. 2016.
MacMillan, Amanda. 6 Things You Must Know About Money and Happiness. Time.com,
Time, Inc., 6 Sept. 2014, http://time.com/3265251/money-and-happiness/. 28
Nov.
2016
Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. Digital image. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Nov. 2016.
<http://www.21stcentech.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/maslow.jpg>.
McLeod, Saul. "Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs." Simplypsychology.org. N.p., 16 Sept. 2013.
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Pipes, Richard. "Results of Communism / Socialism - Discover the Networks."
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"Survey: Certified Divorce Financial Analyst (CDFA) Professionals Reveal the Leading
Causes of
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<https://www.institutedfa.com/Leading-Causes-Divorce/>.

Brown, Tiffany. "We Live In A Money Driven Society." Odyssey. N.p., 27 Sept. 2016. Web. 24
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Cuffin, Eddie. "The 10 Reasons You Should Follow Your Passion And Not The Money." Elite
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Greenman, Amanda. Surprisingly Miserable Lives of 12 Rich and Successful People.
Therichest.com, n.p., 18 Nov. 2014,
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6 Dec. 2016

Walters, John. "Communism Killed 94M in 20th Century, Feels Need to Kill Again."
Reason.com.
N.p., 13 Mar. 2013. Web. 05 Dec. 2016.
<http://reason.com/blog/2013/03/13/communism-killed-94m-in-20th-century>.

Yang, Stephanie. "5 Years Ago Bernie Madoff Was Sentenced to 150 Years In Prison Here's
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