A populist and popular view of money threatens progress in health care, science, agriculture, housing, transportation, education, art and other economic sectors that provide for us.

Consider a recent tweet by state Rep. Stephanie Vigil, D-Colorado Springs.

As rescuers searched for the Titan submarine, Vigil blasted the occupants on Twitter.

"You must really be running out of new good things that money can buy if you're shooting yourself into space, or to the bottom of the ocean, or even just haphazardly acquiring companies that you don't really have anything to contribute to," Vigil's tweet said.

She continued: "No amount of wealth will ever satisfy the ultra-rich, but they just keep acquiring more, and then they'll buy a $250K ticket to a watery grave in a world where that amount of money would be a life-saving windfall to the vast majority of other humans."

Varieties of this economic illiteracy manifest ubiquitously through the cocktail circuit and in social and legacy media.

The Gazette published a society feature years ago on a girl who saved money to fund her bat mitzvah at a Colorado resort. Her parents gifted her a Jeep.

Much to our surprise, this casual story exploded into irrational jealousy. Letters poured in from readers with advice on how this girl and her parents could have better spent the money. Most ideas had some nexus to simply giving it away to those who need it.

Two front-page Gazette articles in May 2020 caused similar discontent. One came under the headline "Housing aid is running dry." Just below was the headline "Bridge to the future," about completion of the $20 million bridge leading to the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Museum.

We got letters. A prominent community leader tweeted: "Thousands of people may be evicted soon, but never fear: we just built a $20m pedestrian bridge."

Indeed. Donations built a $20 million bridge that helped concrete workers, architects and engineers to buy food and pay rents, mortgages, bills and tuitions. Many donated to churches and other charities that feed and shelter the destitute.

Societies that prioritize distribution to the needy have little to give. Without reinvested profits, we would lack our country's surplus of food. Without people who risk death by smashing into trees, because they can afford to ski, we would lack an industry that provides more than 46,000 year-round jobs in Colorado that pay $2 billion in annual income.

No bat mitzvahs mean fewer people affording food, shelter and clothing by driving others to and from the event, selling cakes, designing dresses, selling gifts, waiting on tables, or leasing hotel rooms.

Without people paying hundreds of thousands for undersea and space travel we have fewer jobs created by the need for engineering services, the development and sale of composites, electronics and other goods that advance humanity.

Imagine if the Catholic church — the world's largest nongovernmental provider of medicine and education — curtailed lavish expenditures to expand donations to the poor for nothing in return. Pope Julius II paid Michelangelo 3,000 ducats to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in the early 1500s. That's about $3 million today.

The $3 million (equivalent) could have been "a life-saving windfall" for other humans. For a short time. It's a good bet no recipient of the giveaway would have created a timeless display of majesty that has consistently employed hundreds of tourist workers for 500 years while generating money for all assortment of Vatican charities.

Cash has no intrinsic value. Only exchanges of money — such as acquisition of companies, travel, or anything that motivates human activity — create resources essential to life.

Consider the old traveling salesman tale. He leaves a $100 refundable dog-damage deposit at the hotel. The hotelier runs the $100 next door to pay his grocer. The grocer uses it to pay a supplier. The supplier runs it back to the hotel to pay a sex worker, who uses it to pay her hotel bill. With no dog damage, the salesman retrieves his $100 bill upon checkout, with no knowledge it settled four unrelated debts.

It's not the money, it's the activity money motivates.

Money can buy a fish for someone who needs it. Invested for profit, it motivates the masses to fish for themselves and others. We need charity but cannot have it without investments by the rich — even when it kills them.

The Gazette editorial board

REPRINTED FROM THE COLORADO SPRINGS GAZETTE

Photo credit: Matt Hardy at Unsplash