When Money Became the Measure of Everything (and Why That’s Failing Us)

For a long time, we used money as our primary yardstick of value.

Money came to represent success, achievement, power, freedom, happiness, and possibility. If something generated profit, it was considered worthwhile. If it didn’t, it was dismissed as naïve, inefficient, or indulgent.

At first, this made a certain kind of sense. Money is a useful proxy. It allows exchange. It enables coordination at scale. It creates options.

But somewhere along the way, we let the proxy become the purpose.

Today, nearly everything on Earth must justify its existence financially. If it cannot be monetized, extracted from, scaled, or turned into capital, it is often deemed “not worth doing.”

This is the quiet failure at the heart of our system.

When Profit Becomes the Only Signal

Under a purely capital-driven model, we routinely do things that are toxic to humans and the planet because they generate profit for someone.

We overwork people. We burn out caregivers. We exploit ecosystems. We design technologies that addict rather than serve. We normalize stress, anxiety, loneliness, and meaninglessness, as long as the numbers go up.

Anything that cannot be captured on a balance sheet struggles to survive: care, community, truth, beauty, wisdom, rest, long-term thinking.

This isn’t because humans don’t value these things. It’s because our system doesn’t.

And now the system is reaching the end of its rope.

The Problem Isn’t Money. It’s Monoculture.

Money itself isn’t evil. It’s a tool. The problem is that we made it the only tool that counts.

Imagine trying to understand a human body using only heart rate. Or a relationship using only frequency of contact. Or a mind using only IQ.

You would miss the most important things.

Civilizations fail when they reduce complex living systems to single metrics.

What we need now is not the abolition of money, but the dethroning of money.

Better Indicators of Value and Success

If we were serious about human flourishing, what would we actually measure?

1. Human Wellbeing

Not just income, but:

• Physical healthspan

• Mental health and emotional regulation

• Time affluence and rest

• Nervous system safety

  
  

A wealthy society full of dysregulated people is not successful. It is medicated.

2. Relational Wealth

Life is sustained by relationships, not transactions.

• Strength of close bonds

• Social trust

• Intergenerational connection

• Capacity to give and receive care

  
  

This is wealth that cannot be hoarded without decay.

3. Reduction of Suffering

Instead of asking “does this make money?” we could ask:

• Does this reduce net human suffering?

• Does it improve life downstream, not just now?

• Who bears the cost of this profit?

  
  

Some industries would fail this test immediately. That’s not a bug--that’s information.

4. Regenerative Capacity

Growth assumes infinite resources. Regeneration assumes intelligence.

• Are ecosystems replenishing?

• Are people recovering from burnout?

• Are cultures renewing meaning, not just consuming novelty?

  
  

Extraction without renewal is not productivity. It’s liquidation.

5. Meaning and Agency

• Do people feel their lives matter?

• Do they have real choices?

• Can they say no without risking survival?

  
  

A society that maximizes output while minimizing agency produces despair, not prosperity.

6. Truth Integrity

• Alignment between stated values and actual outcomes

• Transparency of institutions

• Incentives for honesty rather than manipulation

  
  

When truth becomes unprofitable, collapse becomes inevitable.

Beyond Money: Multiple Forms of Capital

If we expanded our accounting, we might recognize:

• Social capital (trust, reciprocity)

• Cognitive capital (learning, wisdom)

• Moral capital (ethical coherence)

• Ecological capital (planetary life support)

• Spiritual capital (meaning, belonging, reverence)

  
  

Money could remain one signal among many, not the master signal that overrides all others.

How Do We Exchange Value Without Making Everything About Money?

Not instead of money, but in addition to it.

We already see early experiments:

• Time banking

• Mutual credit systems

• Commons-based stewardship

• Reputation and trust-based exchange

• Recognition of care labor and invisible work

  
  

Money measures transactions. Life is sustained by relationships.

When we confuse the two, we hollow out what we are trying to grow.

The Deeper Reframe

The system isn’t failing because humans are bad. It’s failing because we mistook means for meaning.

Capital is a tool. Human flourishing is the goal.

When those invert, societies don’t collapse dramatically. They quietly exhaust themselves, spreadsheet by spreadsheet.

The future will belong to those who can design systems that remember what money was always meant to serve.