Webtools for Financial Literacy.   25/02/2007
Author : Graeme Daniel

 "Only when the last tree has died and the last river been poisoned and the last fish been caught will we realise we cannot eat money." -  Cree proverb, cited in Wikipedia's Money


Early in life we came to the conclusion that we couldn't do a lot without money, despite parental warnings about the love of money being 'the root of all evil', and sometimes even twisting the point by leaving the love bit out; they were also forever telling us that 'money doesn't grow on trees', and that 'money doesn't buy happiness', though we had to wonder about that last one, it being quite obvious even to children that poverty and misery went hand-in-hand, and that the whole point about going to work instead of just having fun seemed to be so that people could make enough money to buy the things that would make them happier. Eventually of course we recognised the platitudes for what they were, and settled into trying to learn how to make and manage money, expecting that this would contribute in some measure to our future happiness. And it did.
In this edition of WWWTools for Education, we present a collection of links exploring the nature of money, how it is created, learning resources for facilitating financial literacy, and some indications of trends in currency development.


What Is Money?

Money is:
    ... whatever two people can agree on as a way of exchanging goods (Katie Eagleton / British Museum);... a store of value and a unit of account (Andrew Bailey, Bank of England); ...the thing that gives us potential access to what we want (Keith Hart: Department of Anthropology, University of London) - all cited in What is Money? (The Big Question / Open2: January 08, 2005)

    ... a good that acts as a medium of exchange in transactions. Classically it is said that money acts as a unit of account, a store of value, and a medium of exchange.' (Mike Moffatt / Economics Glossary: about.com) - this page carries much more than the definition.

    ... what we use to buy things with (Robert Schenk / Cyber Economics : July 2006) - has a couple of chapters specifically on money.

    '... commonly defined by the functions attached to any good or token that functions in trade as a medium of exchange, store of value, and unit of account' (Money: Wikipedia)

    ... a publicly agreed symbolic medium of communicating exchange and measure of value and not a storage of value... (Susmita Barua  / seek2know ) - something completely different.


History of Money.

World of Money   (The British Museum) - includes an interesting section on Studying Money.

Sources on Monetary History (Glyn Davies) - an extensive annotated webliography; see also linked the site for A History of Money from Ancient Times to the Present Day, based on the book of the same title.
See also Roy Davies' essay on the Origins of Money and of Banking  (updated May 2005) based on this book.

The Australian Currency (Australia Now: Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade)

Australian Currency (Grant Schmarr,  1999)

Australia's Banking History   (Trevor Sykes / Money, Markets and the Economy: ABC, 1998)

The Story of Money   (Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City)

What Is Money?  (Privateer Market Letter) - successive pages explore the history of money, with emphasis on American currency and the role of gold; ends with an almost current Gold Commentary.

Electric Money   (PBS) - features an interactive Money Timeline for American currency.


How Money Is Created.

Investopedia's What Is Money?   (2003) has a brief section on the creation of money.

This topic is remarkably controversial - see:

•     Wikipedia's article on Money Creation (last modified February 19, 2007)
•     The Wizards of Money Part 1: "How Money Is Created"   - by Smithy at altruists.org   . An audio version is available.
•     How Private, Commercial, National and International Money Is Created  (abridged from the works of Michael Rowbotham / Prosperity: April 2000)    
•     How Money is Created   - Paul Krumm, on rethinking the rules of ownership, stewardship, responsibility, and control, based on the value that we belong to the Earth.    
•     Money is "Created", Not Grown or Built (World Newsstand, 2002)
•     How Money Is Created in Australia (David Kidd)

•     Digital Cash and the Development of the Apolitical Currency (John Michael Makoto Dykes / 1995) - 'digital cash is the natural and logical next step in the evolution of money.'
•     Electric Money   (Robert Cringely / PBS Nova, 2001) - explores the history of money from Money Before Computers to the E-Money Revolution.
•     The Evolution of Currency (James Turk / Journal of Financial Transformation, n.d) - '... expectation that currency is about to evolve yet again. Global online commerce requires it, and so does the high cost of operating our present currency system of money substitutes.'

•     New Forms Of E-currency Emerging In China (DigitalMoneyWorld.com: January 17,2007)
•     Virtual Worlds, Real Profits covers news, trends and analysis in the Real Money Trading (RMT) market for game gold, in-game assets and gamer accounts from online MMORPG games (virtual worlds) such as World of Warcraft, Second Life, Ultima Online and Everquest.

•     Local Exchange Trading Systems   ( Wikipedia)
•     An FAQ on the LETS System   (John Croft, Warwick Rowell)
•     Local Currency Systems listings at dmoz Open Directory Project.    
•     Victoria LETS (British Columbia) - a good example.
•     BARTER/LETS 101  (cyberclass.net) - links to lots of learning resources.
•     How Money Systems Work (Transaction Net) - compares Design Characteristics of Representative Currency Systems, and considers Social Implications of Currency System Features.

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