'Money lends a welcome kind of social equality to the poor.' Photo: John McArthur on Unsplash
To coin a phrase: Clive Ashwin talks money
‘The growing hostility to money, especially cash, is contributing to today’s social ills.’
A popular song of 1946, when I was a child, went as follows: ‘Money is the root of all evil / Won’t contaminate myself with it / Take it away, take it away, take it away!’ Anxiety about the malign influence of money permeates Christian thought, expressed in Paul’s warning to Timothy: ‘For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.’
But should we think of money itself as intrinsically evil? The accumulation of money for its own sake is of course morally deplorable. But what about the gathering of sufficient money to ensure that one is self-reliant and not a burden to others? Or to enable one to support others who are less fortunate? For most charitable initiatives we are not in a position to offer support in kind, but we can send money, which is then converted into relief.
During a part of my childhood our family was dependent upon National Assistance to provide basics such as food, clothing and rent. My mother received payments in cash, and when she spent it her money was as good as the next customer’s. Money lends a welcome kind of social equality to the poor.
The only benefit we received in kind were my boots. I remember the embarrassment of having to go to school in black boots when other children were wearing shoes. Those boots were a public signal of our poverty.
These memories came back to me when I learned of the admirable campaign to provide free meals for children whose families cannot afford food. I sympathise with Friends who felt that this was an initiative worth supporting. But its principal value is as a warning that the benefits system is not working, and that some families are falling below the radar, a problem which must be corrected, not accepted and institutionalised.
The provision of relief in kind rather than cash has its attractions. It is sometimes argued that if you give people food rather than cash, you know it cannot be mis-spent. But the same principle could be extended to the provision of clothing, footwear, accommodation and other necessities. Indeed, this is the principle which underpinned the philosophy of the Victorian workhouse. By giving money rather than relief in kind you restore self-respect and a sense of control.
The growing hostility to money, especially cash, is, I believe, contributing to today’s social ills. Without the discipline of having to offer cash at the checkout many credit card users drift unwittingly into debt. The modern epidemic of gambling addiction is inconceivable without the availability of credit cards and online payment.
Money, far from being evil, is one of our most liberating inventions. It is impossible to think of any society that has become what we would recognise as ‘advanced’ without it. Early Friends had no anxieties about it. It is not money itself but its unjust distribution which gives rise to social problems. As Francis Bacon elegantly put it, ‘Money is like muck, not good except it be spread.’
