“Money makes the world go round.”
– John Kander, Fred Ebb.
Money is the oil in the machine. Used effectively, it circulates around all the moving parts, keeping the engine running smoothly. (The engine also needs to be connected to the wheels before we can go anywhere.)
Money is a very useful means of assessing the value a person’s labour, skills, produce etc. has to the rest of society, and “Economics” is how we model some of the complex social interactions that mankind engages in. But economic models are only human constructs, not reality. However good a servant they are, they make truly dreadful masters.
Of itself money is worthless. It only has value when it is invested in one of the other capitals. But because we only measure money itself, and not the value it delivers in terms of other capitals, we’re always trying to adjust reality to fit the economic model. We hoard wealth (where it does no good) and squander it on things that deliver short-term financial gain but have no lasting or intrinsic value. We put fortunes in the hands of the money-obsessed and least socially responsible people, to the detriment of all the other four capitals.
The Trust promotes effective economic management – i.e. measuring return on financial investment in terms of balanced capital.