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We Don't Need the World, We Only Need Money June 15, 2026
The idea that modifying or replacing currency will solve problems of corrupted values, perverse incentives, destabilizing asymmetries of wealth and power and the civilizational psychosis of "growth of consumption and profits at any cost" is illusory.
An old friend summarized the mindset of much of the developed world wryly and succinctly: "We don't need the world, we only need money." In other words, we don't actually need real-world sources of life's essentials that are within our control or a functional biosphere because since we can buy everything we could possibly want or need with money. So, money is all we need. We don't care where the stuff we want/need comes from because it will always come from somewhere and be available in whatever quantity and quality we desire, as somebody somewhere will keep our stores and fuel tanks fully stocked and our electrical grid powered 24/7. This disconnect between the complex mechanics of real-world manufacturing, processing and transport--a world of physical materials reconfigured by productive work--is understandable in a consumer economy of transactions of money where all the work, all the materials and all the consequences are invisible to the consumer plugging in an appliance, fueling their car and buying an item off the shelf. An economy that favors assets and financial speculation as the means to acquiring wealth is also disconnected from the role of productive work in this invisible world of production and supply chains. These disconnects from the real world and productive work have created a make-believe mindset in which doing something with money is all we need to do to get rich and preserve our wealth. I call this make-believe world civilizational psychosis, a mindset detached from reality for it mischaracterizes the relationships of the material world, productive work and currency / money. This make-believe world in which money is all that matters is not a sustainable society or economy. In this make-believe world, shape-shifting money is the solution to all problems. Common sense and history both support the conclusion that a financial system that must borrow from the future and pay interest on that rising debt to fund the present is not sustainable and will be replaced with some other arrangement one way or another. All the solutions being bandied about are money-based: stablecoins, gold-backed currencies, etc. The idea behind all of these proposals is that changing money will fix whatever's broken in a system that has lost touch with its material foundations and productive work. This mindset explains the conventional conviction that all one has to do to live extremely well is navigate the coming collapse of the current money system (i.e. fiat currencies and credit) and emerge from the other side of the wormhole with wealth intact in some other form. This mindset makes three implicit assumptions: 1. The real world will continue functioning perfectly despite the collapse of the current money system, ensuring fuel tanks are full, the electricity is on 24/7 and all the retail shelves are full of all the good things. 2. The majority who did not successfully navigate the collapse of the current money system and are now impoverished will passively accept their serfdom to the New Nobility who successfully emerged with wealth intact--or greatly increased (see #3). 3. Since the new form of money will be scarce--and this is the source of its value as a replacement currency--those who own it will accrue virtually all the "value" embedded in "money:" all those who held the old currency that's now worthless will have zero "money:" those who own the new form of money will own all the scarcity value of the new currency. If history is any guide, the distribution of those who manage to convert all their "old" wealth into "new" wealth is highly asymmetric, as the vast majority lack the means to manage the conversion on a scale where the resulting wealth is consequential. In other words, the rich tend to manage the conversion and everyone else doesn't. So the rich get richer and everyone else is wiped out. This has a corollary: since those who manage the conversion will emerge on the other side of the wormhole with wealth, "money" is no longer bound to work/labor: the wealthy have no need to generate value via work, they merely provide demand via spending their wealth. None of these assumptions strike me as realistic, practical or desirable. Let's examine what happens to supply chains when fiat currencies (the current form of money) crash in purchasing power (i.e. hyper-inflation or loss of trust in the currency) and the replacement currency is a gold-backed currency. Those favoring gold-or-commodity backed currencies tend to forget that scale is a primary characteristic of "money" used in global transactions. If the gold-backed currency (or cryptocurrency) in circulation can only fund 10% of the current global volume of currency transactions--around $9 to $10 trillion dollars a day--and 90% of the new currency is locked in domestic accounts and unavailable for global transactions--then this new currency can only grease 1% of the current demand for global currency trading. The global supply chain system crashes because there is not enough currency outside the issuing entity to grease the immense daily trade in currency for trade, debt, speculation, hedging, etc. The whole point of a currency backed by a limited commodity is that it can't expand 10-fold overnight because that would reduce the purchasing power of the currency by the same factor. In other words, a replacement currency must provide the same scale of not only currency in circulation but the same scale of liquidity available for global settlements of trade, debt, speculation and hedging--currently trillions of dollars per day. Anything less and the entire global trade / credit network freezes up. Consider what happens to enterprises in supply chains who continued accepting now-worthless "old" currency. They're now bankrupt, so whatever chains they were links in are now broken. Those enterprises that prudently held off accepting any orders until the situation settled down have nothing in the pipeline, so whatever chains they were part of are also broken. Those who decide to only accept some scarce monetary substitute are sitting on their hands, as they've been outbid by more desperate dealers / traders. In summary, if the current "money" dissolves, global supply chains immediately dissolve, too, and expecting a relatively limited volume of replacement currency with a tiny float to ramp up 10-fold while retaining its scarcity value is delusional, as the entire point of scarcity value as the basis of a currency is destroyed if the issuance jumps up 10-fold to handle global trade needs while the quantity of the underlying commodity remains unchanged. The real world breaks down immediately, and nobody will restock the shelves that are now bare, or refill the fuel tanks that are now empty, or restart the grid. As for #2, the impoverished and those hanging onto "middle class status" by a thread had hope in the old system because the shelves were still full. Now that the old money has dissolved and the shelves are empty, they're not just impoverished, they have lost hope and are now angry. They are unlikely to view those who emerge from the wormhole wealthy favorably. They will likely view this as the penultimate form of unfairness and inequality and take action they reckon is appropriate, rebalancing the inequality by expropriation. Telling them that they will now be able to turn their labor into real wealth down the road as serfs in a neofeudal arrangement is unlikely to persuade them that the New Nobility deserves its wealth and dominance. As for the connection between the material world, productive work and money, there is no sustainable economy or society possible until these bonds are restored. The road to wealth must run through being productive in the material world rather than speculation. This has been lost in the current speculative mania and the associated civilizational psychosis that we "don't need the world, only need money" and the best way to acquire that money is speculating in assets and money. (I discuss the connections of money and work in my book Money and Work Unchained.) In summary: the idea that modifying or replacing currency / money will solve problems of corrupted values, perverse incentives, destabilizing asymmetries of wealth and power and the civilizational psychosis of "growth of consumption and profits at any cost" is illusory. We would be wise to ponder changing far more about how we live than our monetary system, which is a manifestation of corrupted values, perverse incentives, destabilizing asymmetries and civilizational psychosis rather than their source. Reorganizing the monetary system to serve a sustainable social order is certainly part of the overall set of solutions, but that alone is not enough to fix what's broken at deeper levels than what we use as money. Charts of interest: wealth of the top 0.1%: 
Percentage of financial assets held by the top 1%--up 42% since 1990: financial assets held by the bottom 50%, down 28%. 
Labor's share of the economy: all-time lows: 
Non-bank assets: hyper-financialization: 
TCMDO: total credit: 
My book Investing In Revolution is available at a 10% discount ($18 for the paperback, $24 for the hardcover and $8.95 for the ebook edition). Introduction (free) Become a $3/month patron of my work via patreon.com Subscribe to my Substack for free My recent books: Disclosure: As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases originated via links to Amazon products on this site. THE REVOLUTION TRILOGY: Investing In Revolution Ultra-Processed Life The Mythology of Progress Systemic Problems/Solutions Investing In Revolution (2025) Introduction (free) The Mythology of Progress (2024) Introduction (free) Global Crisis, National Renewal (2021) Introduction (free) Money and Work Unchained (2017) Introduction (free) A Radically Beneficial World (2015) Introduction (free) What You Can Do Yourself Ultra-Processed Life (2025) Introduction (free) Self-Reliance in the 21st Century (2022) Introduction (free) When You Can't Go On: Burnout, Reckoning and Renewal (2022) Introduction (free) Get a Job, Build a Real Career and Defy a Bewildering Economy (2014) Intro (free) Novels The Adventures of the Consulting Philosopher Intro (free) The Secret Life of an Asian Heroine First chapters (free) Become a $3/month patron of my work via patreon.com. Subscribe to my Substack for free Investing In Revolution print $18, (Kindle $8.95, Hardcover $24 (145 pages, 2025) 
Only now do we see that we've been investing in revolution for decades--not the revolutions we thought we were investing in, revolutions in technology and finance, but in the social revolution made inevitable by the extremes that we've reached in our single-minded pursuit of private gains.
The pendulum that we've pushed to an extreme will swing to the opposite extreme, and the artifices that have propped up a facade a stability for decades will accelerate the disorder rather than reverse it. We now stand at the point of decision, and this book offers a path to a reformation and renewal that serves the shared interests of us all, not just the few. Introduction (free) Ultra-Processed Life print $16, (Kindle $7.95, audiobook, Hardcover $20 (129 pages, 2025) 
Ultra-Processed Life: the substitution of a synthetic, commoditized, very profitable facsimile for what was once authentic.
Ultra-Processed Life is my term for everything that is analogous to ultra-processed snacks: attractively marketed, instantly alluring, easy to consume, addictive by design, tasty in the moment but harmful over time, its origins a black box of unknown processes, the brightly colored product bearing no resemblance to the real-world ingredients, an idealized form of what is inherently imperfect, untethered from the natural world. As with many others, the catalyst for my exploration was a life-threatening medical crisis that did not have a specific cause. This led me to wonder if our entire way of life is like an ultra-processed snack: tasty but not healthy, edible but stripped of the nutrients we need to be healthy, addictive by design. Introduction (free) The Mythology of Progress, Anti-Progress and a Mythology for the 21st Century print $20, (Kindle $9.95, Hardcover $24 (215 pages, 2024) audiobook, Read the Introduction and first chapter for free (PDF) 
What if the policies to accelerate growth are no longer working because our fix for every problem--growth at any cost--is failing? We're told Progress is inevitable as a result of technology, but everyday life is getting harder, not easier--the opposite of Progress, what I call Anti-Progress.
What if the real source of the unraveling is far deeper than economics or politics? What if the problem is what we see as the inevitable destiny of humanity--Progress--is actually a modern mythology, disconnected from the real-world consequences of growth for growth's sake? We indignantly reject that Progress is a mythology, but our need for mythology hasn't gone away because we've mastered technology; we've created a modern mythology of technology that is heedless of its own consequences. To truly progress, we need a new mythology aligned to 21st century realities. Read the Introduction and first chapter for free
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Extra-Special Bonus Aphorisms:
"There is no security on this earth; there is only opportunity." (Douglas MacArthur) "We are what we repeatedly do." (Aristotle) "Do the thing and you shall have the power." (Ralph Waldo Emerson) "Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction." (E.F. Schumacher, via Tom R.) "He who will not risk cannot win." (John Paul Jones) "When we drink coffee, ideas march in like the army." (Honore de Balzac) "Progress is not possible without deviation." (Frank Zappa, via Richard Metzger) "Victory favors those who take pains." (amat victoria curam) "The man who has a garden and a library has everything." (Cicero, via Lee Bentley) "A healthy homecooked family meal and a home garden are revolutionary acts." (CHS) "Do you know what amazes me more than anything else? The impotence of force to organize anything." (Napoleon Bonaparte) "The way of the Tao is reversal" Or "Reversal is the movement of Tao." (Lao Tzu) "Chance favours the prepared mind." (Louis Pasteur) "Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm." (Winston Churchill) "Where there is ruin, there is hope for treasures." (Rumi) "The realm of gratitude is boundless." (CHS, 11/25/15) "History doesn't have a reverse gear." (CHS, 12/22/15) Smith's Law of Conservation of Risk: Every sustained action has more than one consequence. Some consequences will appear positive for a time before revealing their destructive nature. Some consequences will be intended, some will not. Some will be foreseeable, some will not. Some will be controllable, some will not. Those that are unforeseen and uncontrollable will trigger waves of other unforeseen and uncontrollable consequences. (July 8, 2014)(thanks to Lew G. for retitling the idea.) Smith's Neofeudalism Principle #1: If the citizenry cannot replace a kleptocratic authoritarian government and/or limit the power of the financial Aristocracy at the ballot box, the nation is a democracy in name only. The Smith Corollary to Metcalfe's Law (The Network Effect): the value of the network is created not just by the number of connected devices/users but by the value of the information and knowledge shared by users in sub-networks and in the entire network. (CHS, 4/6/16) My Credo of Liberation: I no longer care if the power centers of our society--the distant, fortified castles of our financial feudal system--are changed by my actions, for I am liberated by the act of resistance. I am no longer complicit in perpetuating fraudulent feudalism and the pathology of concentrated power. I no longer covet signifiers of membership in the Upper Caste that serves the plutocracy. I am liberated from self-destructive consumerist-State financialization and the delusion that debt servitude and obedience to sociopathological Elites serve my self-interests. (Thank you, Klaus-Peter L., for reminding me) "We've become a culture of excuses rather than solutions: solutions always require sustained effort and discipline." (CHS 4/9/16) "Fraud as a way of life caters an extravagant banquet of consequences." (CHS 4/14/16) "Creativity = problem solving = value creation." (CHS 6/4/16) "Truth is powerful because it is the core dynamic of solving problems." (CHS 7/21/17) "We live in a system of human emotions that masquerades as a science (economics)." (CHS 1/1/18) "Always remember, your focus determines your reality." (George Lucas) "Diversity is for poor people. Sameness is for the successful." (GFB) "When power dissipates suddenly, it dissipates completely." (CHS 7/14/19) "Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty. The obedient must be slaves." (Henry David Thoreau) "Markets cannot price in the value of non-monetized natural assets such as diverse ecosystems." (CHS 7/14/19) "Magical thinking isn't optimism, it is folly." CHS 1/3/22) "Tune in (to self-reliance), drop out (of hyper-consumerism and debt-serfdom) and turn on (to relocalizing capital and agency)." (CHS 1/5/22) "The path to everything you desire starts here: like yourself as you are right now." (CHS 11/20/22) "There are only two signals: how many essentials you produce and share and if you're consuming less with better results. Everything else is noise." (CHS 12/17/22) "Liberation is no longer needing any confirmation or feedback from others or the world for one's sense of self. Wealth, fame, recognition, admiration, praise, prestige, approval, sainthood, martyrdom, success: none are needed, none are desired." (CHS 12/26/22) "When fame, wealth, prestige, status and glory are out of reach, you're free to pursue other more valuable things." (CHS 2/6/22) "It is the sacred duty of every activist who seeks to better their community to grow and share as much life-giving food as is humanly possible." (CHS 6/15/23) "Being anonymous, gray and unknown is the ideal state of freedom." (CHS 3/15/24) "We seem to have entered a world of anti-leisure and anti-productivity in which the unpaid shadow work demanded to keep all the complicated digital bits in motion obliterate our leisure and productivity." CHS (5/22/24) "It is axiomatic that failing systems work the best just before they fail catastrophically." Ray W. "Looking younger is mere technique; thinking younger demands creativity." CHS (10/16/24) "Tell me what's taboo and I'll tell you the truths that threaten the status quo." CHS (12/15/24) "This is the core of the Attention Economy: the ultimate addiction is the addiction to ourselves." CHS (1/28/25) "If You Seek the Truth, Look for What's Taboo." CHS (7/18/25) "My definition of self-reliance: the less you need, the easier it is to get what you need." CHS (7/26/25) "Mastery requires reading and doing." CHS (7/28/25) "The replacement of authentic value, quality, agency, choice, trust, legitimacy and experience with self-serving facsimiles is the key dynamic of Ultra-Processed Life, my term for the present-day human condition." CHS (8/12/25) "Ultra-Processed Life replaces an authentic experience with a synthetic, simulated, commoditized, highly profitable version that's superficially attractive but destructive over the long term." CHS (8/12/25) "What we see everywhere is the replacement of authentic things--including democracy--with synthetic facsimiles designed to maintain the illusion of choice and value." CHS (8/12/25) "Sometimes certainty is the enemy we don't even see and uncertainty is our most faithful ally." CHS (9/20/25) "Sanitized, homogenized, synthesized Ultra-Processed Life isn't more fun; it's just more profitable." CHS (4/6/26) "AI is ultra-processed cognition." CHS (4/6/26) |
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