Money Wisdom #23

"Words are wise men's counters, they do but reckon with them, but they are the money of fools".

Thomas Hobbes quoted in Bynum et al (1981) p.300

from Rupert Sheldrake The Presence of the Past (2011)  l.1863 (Kindle)

Post about Posts

I've been bombarded by tweets & emails begging me to publish my latest essay. Not really.

I do feel some perverse sense of duty to get it out there though, mainly due to the fact that I've said several times that its on its way. However, its my work, and its my decision. And I really don't want to put anything out there about money that I'm not totally happy with. There are a couple of problems with the essay. Firstly, it seems to be turning into a much longer piece. It does appear to have a natural flow - which is a very good thing - and to curtail it just to satisfy my desire to get a bit of feedback seems wrong. Secondly, I'm switching a little between audiences. One minute I'm writing for an academic audience, the next I'm writing for the general reader. I don't think its a fatal error, but its one I want to get fixed in the first 10K words.

The essay is an exposition of my peculiar view of money - which pretty much sums up most of what I write about money - but for the first time, I've set it in an historical/evolutionary context and it seems to work for me. Seems like an obvious thing to do, and its surprising that I've not done it before. I have managed to find the hard copies of the work I did on this about ten years ago - about 60-70K words in all - which I'll re-read. In fact, I may publish some of this in the meantime. Or I may just put out bit-size chunks of my new piece. I certainly intend to put more out there this year than I have in previous years. It would be nice to get some momentum going.

I also intend to write a few of my poetic pieces. I use the term very loosely, of course. I get a sense of satisfaction from doing these. Its nice to let go of the fear of how people might interpret what I say. 'Price is to Money, as Weight is to Gravity' for example gets across so much of what I think about Money, but its not a phrase that would sit too well in an essay without several chapters of explanation. Sometimes its nice to just let them slip into people's consciousness and see what happens. My shorter pieces give me the chance to do this.

So the general idea is more posts about money - more book reviews, more short pieces, some extended pieces - and less posts like this. The blogger's curse. Posts about posts. Yuck.

A Review of 'Priceless' by William Poundstone

As a twitter buddy of mine pointed out, with a name like Bill Poundstone you'd be destined to write this book. It's an easy read with plenty of interesting anecdotes which serve to highlight Poundstone's exposition of behavioural economics as it relates to pricing. Brief histories of the personalities involved in the subject helped to sustain my interest; experimental design is important, but it can be a little dull reading about it.

I'm a money freak - history, philosophy, sociology of money - so I approached the book from this perspective. However, I think it would be of interest to the business reader, the academic or indeed the general reader. It gives the reader an insight into the techniques that can be used to set - and achieve - a price. Poundstone shows that what we think about price very much depends on context. On its own, the understanding of the power of anchoring - a bid/offer that sets context for and influences how you'll feel about a price- will repay you the cost of the book.

Happy New Year 2012

Happy New Year to You

I just want open up the new year with a brief miscellaneous post.

I've been feeling a little frustrated with my job. Apologies for the odd moan on twitter. I shouldn't feel sorry for myself. I've been a lot more productive with my money stuff in 2011 than I was in 2010, and that's what I'm really concerned about. When I take into account holidays etc, my current job pays pretty much the same as the tour managing. There's not the same kudos, of course. But when I'm at home I can completely forget about my job, that was never the case with the music industry stuff.

I feel like I've taken a good leap forward in 2011 with my Owning & Owing essay - even though its not finished. I look forward to putting it out there. I feel like it might have given me a new structure to explore my ideas about money. I'll admit that at times in 2011 I have thought I should really attempt to go into academia via a PHD or something. I faced a choice in 2000 about whether to continue into post-graduate studies at the LSE, or do something more interesting ;) I'm sure some may say that my current occupation would indicate that I made the wrong choice. But I don't have any regrets about that. In some ways I wish that I'd just done the van driving 5 years ago rather than getting involved with the music industry.

The other problem with academia for me is that my ideas about money are really odd. I had one Professor tell me that my ideas were 'plainly crazy'. Fair enough. But then neo-classical economics is 'clearly wrong', so who knows, 'crazy' might be closer to the truth ! At the end of the day, what I want to do is explore my ideas about money, academia (or any other job) has to be a means to that, not an end in itself. Sounds a bit arrogant and self indulgent when I put it like that, but that's how it is, I'm afraid.

So all that is a long winded way of saying what most people say at the start of a New Year - I want to be more productive this year. With both my kids moving out off to Uni, who knows I might just do it.

Money Wisdom #22

"Whatever has value in our world now does not have value in itself, according to its nature - nature is always value-less, but has been given value at some time, as a present - and it was we who gave and bestowed it."

Friedrich Nietzsche The Gay Science (1882:301)

A Bit of Christmas Wisdom

I'd thought I'd share this little bit of wisdom with you. You're unlikely to have come across it unless you're a money freak like me because it comes from Theodore Caplow's 1984 paper Rule enforcement without visible means: Christmas Gift Giving in Middletown which was originally published in American Journal of Sociology 89:1306-23. I came across it in James Carrier's excellent Gifts and Commodities - Exchange & Western Capitalism since 1700. Are you ready for this?

Women are particularly resentful of oversized items that seem to say that the giver perceives them as "fat".

 Theodore Caplow (1984: 1314) 

You can keep your Higgs Boson, this is the sort of thing we need to know.

Anyways, to briefly update you, I'm still working on my Owning & Owing piece. Its turned from and extended blog post into something more like an essay.

Have a Merry Christmas!

To Forgive is Divine - Money Burning 23/10/11

I want you to do this.

I want you to take a £10, £20 or £50 note, or more if you can afford it. And burn it.

If you want to perpetuate poverty, if you like the idea of rich and poor, then give it to charity. 

If you want change, burn it.

This is what actually happens when you burn your cash.

By destroying your paper currency you lose your claim to its value. The debt it represents still exists, recorded in the ledgers of the Bank of England (or whoever else issues it). Burning the note says you’re not collecting the debt.

By burning the note you are forgiving your debtors.

If this seems a little counter-intuitive to you, allow me to give you a very brief history of the Bank of England.

Towards the end of the 1600’s, King William III’s war against France was proving very costly. A Scot, William Patterson thought of a way to raise more money. He reckoned that £1.2 million could be obtained from subscribers to the idea of a ‘Bank of England’. This money could be given over as a loan to help fight the war. In return an interest rate of 8% would be paid from taxes. So, having raised £1.2 million in just a few weeks, the Bank of England was duly formed on 27th July 1694. The bank issued notes to its depositors. If you put £100 in, you had a note saying so. That note also said that anyone presenting it to the bank would be redeemed in gold or coinage. So if you owed someone £100, you could sign your £100 deposit note over to your creditor. He'd accept the note in payment because he’d have faith in the bank’s ability to pay. After all, the bank lent most of its money to the King, and the King had to be good for it. Eventually these notes became the money that I want you to burn.

By the way, the King's debt from 1694, has never been repaid. Every burnt, lost and never found, or other-wise destroyed item of live currency has alleviated a little of the debt burden. Destroying currency is literally offering forgiveness. So when someone says that making a charitable donation is the best thing you can do with your money, you know that's not true. You may think charity is a virtue but you know that to forgive is divine.

Nevertheless, despite the historical evidence, and despite the logic, some will see your burning as a selfish act. Their reasoning is simply this; with the cash you've burned you could have put food on the plate of a starving person. This is true. But its true for every penny that you spend, as well as the cash you burn.

The difference is of course that for every penny you spend you get something in return, whether you're donating to charity or splashing out on a luxury. Even when you tuck £20 into your niece or nephew's birthday card, you want something back. It might just be a ‘thank you’, but you still expect a return on your money. You still expect a little interest. You may be reluctant to accept this now. See how you feel after your sacrifice.

There is only one pure gift you can give and that is to burn your money. Those who set themselves against your sacrifice are really only saying one thing, “why don’t you give it to me?”

On the 23rd of October 2011 I released the Bank of England from the promise made in notes EE45 406557 and HD02 163519 to each pay the sum of ten pounds sterling to the bearer. These notes will never be presented for payment. This is my fourth year of offering money burning sacrifice.

The most important thing about it, is that I know what it feels like.

You can too. Change comes through people doing things they've never done before. Burn your money.

Give us each day our daily bread,

and forgive us our sins,

for we ourselves forgive everyone who

is indebted to us.

And lead us not into temptation.

Luke 11:2-4

Money Wisdom #21

"..money seems to be the most frequent and convenient axis on which millenarian movements turn."

Kenelm Burridge New Heaven, New Earth (1969) p.146

A Review of 'The History of Money' by Jack Weatherford

To me the cover of this book makes it look rather dry and serious. But really, its a highly enjoyable romp through money's past. I appreciate that this sounds dismissive, but its not meant to. The book does lack the intellectual depth and rigour of say, fellow anthroplogist Greaber's 'Debt - the first 5000 years', or economic historian Davies' 'A History of Money'. Nevertheless, if what Weatherford set out to do was write an engaging and readable history in 250 odd pages, then he has succeeded.

The book is divided into three parts. The first 'Classic Cash' grips you with gory detail about exchange in the ancient and medieval world. The second 'Paper Money' gives a bird's eye view of money from around the time of the reformation and through the industrial revolution. The third is 'Electronic Cash' where Weatherford brings us up to date and even speculates on the future a little.

I can't see this book being quoted in academic works, or appearing in too many bibliographies. However, bringing the history of money to a wider public is hugely important, and this book is a noble effort. If you're going to do an economics 101, or any finance related course, it'll put things in perspective for you.

I enjoyed it. And I recommend it.

This review is posted on Amazon here. If you found this review helpful please visit the Amazon site and vote for it.

In praise of And You and I

Inspired by last week's dream where I gave a corking rendition of Awaken [with variations] after temporarily replacing Jon Anderson in Yes, and with my confidence bolstered by the heart-warming twitter reaction to last friday's #pinkfloyd night on BBC4, I'm going to share some magic with you.

Now, if you're thinking, 'oh God, not a post on Yes' then waste no more of your time reading. Instead spend 23 seconds watching, but more importantly listening to, the video directly below. It starts at 4:27, you can end it when you like, but please give it at least 23 seconds.



So, now I know I have a convert to the word of Yes. Great. Lets get into some train-spotting style detail.

Firstly you'll notice that this is not a post on Yes, but rather a post on one particular Yes song, And You and I; top of my fantasy Desert Island Discs list. The version above comes from my favourite Yes line up (Anderson, Howe, Squire, Wakeman, White) performing at the Montreaux Jazz festival in 2003 as part of their 35th anniversary tour. Comments from it's Youtube page say that the concert is regarded as one of their finest ever. I'd have to concur - at least it certainly seems that way from the videos. Unfortunately I wasn't there.

However I did manage to catch the same 35th anniversary line up at Glastonbury where they appeared a couple of weeks before they played Montreaux. My wife and I were at the front, stage right (near Steve Howe) but I haven't managed to see myself in this video. I'm pleased. I kept my sunglasses on to hide my tears. Sad but true. The video doesn't add much our understanding or appreciation of And You and I, but hey, its Yes! at Glastonbury! Things just don't get better than that.



A couple of years before, Yes (this time without Wakeman) performed the track with a orchestra in Amsterdam. I'm not sure that the orchestra comes through particularly well in the mix, nevertheless they do add a sense of gravitas - as symphonic orchestras tend to. I like the golden robots.



The video is subtitled. Anderson's lyrics are often a cause for ridicule for philistines - sorry, I mean those who don't like Yes. His approach is to write words that fit with/come from the music. In other words he doesn't write a poem that is meant to stand without the music. And in fact it can be a little distracting reading the lyrics while you listen to the piece; your mind seems to try get meaning from the written word, rather than the sung lyric.

When I first got hooked into Yes I didn't really get Anderson's approach to lyrics. I preferred the way that Roger Waters seemed to be able to make coherent statements about modern life and society. Waters' lyrics seemed to be more intelligent. But my view has changed as I've got older. Allowing the music to dictate the meaning of the lyrics requires the writer to lose his ego. (Waters' ego, of course, got famously out of control to the point where he believed he was Pink Floyd). What this means, is that although a book of Jon Anderson's lyrics may not be a great read, the point in And You and I, where he sings:

There'll be no mutant enemy, we shall certify;
Political ends, as sad remains, will die.
Reach out as forward tastes begin to enter you.

is sublime. What could be more optimistic? What brighter version of the future could there be than one where politics are no longer needed? We'll know that there are no bogeymen. Fear won't be used as a weapon against us. By being aware of this vision of the future, we take a step towards it.

There's little or no cynicism in Anderson's lyrics. I think this makes some people a little uncomfortable. I guess they feel that a certain amount of cynicism is needed to connect music and lyrics to reality. After all rock music has its roots the blues. Doesn't singing about fantasy lands where we can all love each other freely, ignore those roots and gloss over our reality. Such naivety surely only appeals to middle class teenagers who don't know how tough life can be?

Here's my answer to that criticism:

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can.
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man. 

Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world.

We need to dream.

As an aside, there's an interesting juxtaposition between Imagine and And You And I. Imagine expresses what is essentially a communist ideal, whereas And You and I expresses a libertarian ideal. I love both songs, and of course there is no actual connection (except Alan White who played drums on Imagine), but both songs seem to share something essential; they have spirituality without regard to religion.

I did find this piece of literary criticism from (what I think) is a second year English major. He seems to love the song as much as me - or at least he did back in 1975. In the past I've also read Bill Martin's fabulous The Music of Yes - Structure and Vision in Progressive Rock. Bill gives a detailed analysis of many of the great Yes songs, including And You and I. If my memory serves me correctly he sees elements of Blake's Songs of Innocence and Experience in the track, and of Karl Polanyi's Great Transformation; "Coins and Crosses never know their fruitless worth". But I gifted my copy of Bill's book to friend and fellow Yes fan, so I can't check.

My own favourite version of And You and I comes from 1991's reunion tour. I was fortunate to go to one of the Wembley Arena shows. I know they played And You and I but I have absolutely no memory of it. It must have completely phased me out. The Union tour combined all the different Yes line-ups, so Trevor Rabin plays the section that you can see Steve Howe playing in the Montreaux video. Its interesting to note that Howe seems to have adopted Rabin's grander more guitar-god approach to this section in the later performances. And I think it works.

Anyway for your enjoyment here is my all time favourite version of my all time favourite piece of music from the reunion tour that I can't remember (I think its from an American gig). Thank goodness for youtube. Unfortunately the video is split into two parts but below the videos I've put the soundcloud of the same live version of the track as it appeared on the YesTerdays 4CD compilation.





09 And You and I Cord of Life Eclipse The Preacher the Teacher Apoca ... by jonone100

Jon Anderson talks at the start of the track about how this song has grown with age. I've seen Rick Wakeman say the same thing about it. For a long time Awaken was my favourite Yes track, but that changed after seeing Anderson, Bruford, Wakeman, Howe (a Yes offshot - if you can call it ) perform And You an I in 1989 (again, at Wembley Arena).

This video is from that 1989 tour. Even before Rabin turbo-charges the song it has begun to take on a new more magisterial form compared to its original album version; largely due to Wakeman's keys I think.



I could spend a brief moment talking about the musical structure of And You and I. Or, I could just direct you to this wiki page which tells you all you need to know.

The next couple of videos take us back to the first few years of the song's life. A live version from 1973 (with poor sound) which for a long time was the only live version available to Yes fans.



Next you have the original album version from 'Close to the Edge'. There was yet another version released on the 2003 remastered Close to the Edge - I think its an even earlier studio version. Unfortunately I seem to have mislaid my copy of it. I remember it as even more folky and less epic the actual album track. Perhaps someone could confirm this in the comments.



So there you have it. My favourite piece of music. Developed from what is, in Yes's perspective, almost a folk/pop song (albeit a ten minute one in four sections) into a epic piece. But one that still manages to maintain the intimacy of the original. The track Close to the Edge was the biggest on the album. Stomping in at nearly 19 minutes, again in 4 sections, with Wakeman's church organ spectacular in the middle, it gave critics of the band, enough ammunition for years to come. But the little track hiding away in the shadow of the Edge has grown into a piece of such immense power, but with such a soft touch, that it eclipses even that most monumental Yes tune, Awaken.

Of course you may disagree. I know that a lot of serious Yes fans love Siberian Khatru. Hopefully though, whichever Yes song it is that does for you, what And You and I does for me, you'll agree that we need a Yes night on BBC4.

I do get a perverse pleasure from hearing Yes ridiculed. And that's a proper perversion, friends. But really what I want, is just to share a bit of Yes joy. Their music moves me. And I think, as much as music can be, its important. Its says stuff to us that we need to hear.

Chief among Yes detractors was John Peel whose influence over the music scene was immeasurable. Indeed, it was at the Glastonbury gig in 2003 when he said live on air that Yes had been a band he'd 'loved to hate over the years'. I'm glad he recognised his own ambivalence. And he had actually been a help to Yes (as he was to so many bands) in the early years. But I do think his jibes helped alienate people - albeit unintentionally. It'd be nice if the BBC restored the karmic balance and gave Yes an evening. There are other long serving great British bands that deserve similar - Gong for example (who I had the pleasure and honour of taking to Glastonbury in 2009). But as far as Yes are concerned, John Peel incurred a debt on the BBC's behalf. That debt needs repaying.

Once done, Peel can be beatified.  

I listened hard but could not see
Life tempo change out and inside me.
The preacher trained in all to lose his name,
The teacher travels asking to be shown the same.
In the end we'll agree, we'll accept, we'll immortalise
That the truth of the man maturing in his eyes
All complete in the sight of seeds of life with you.

Anyone know the right person to email at the beeb?