In economic terms, what do we call the most exchanged thing?
That is, for the trillions of transactions that take place daily, exchanging one thing for another, out of all those trillions of exchanged things, what do we call the most exchanged thing?
It doesn't matter what form it takes, whatever it is that is the most exchanged thing, what do we call it?
Money! By money, I mean THE money. Which all people everywhere use in exchanges more than any other thing, without needing to test its source for validity before accepting it in exchange for another thing. Eventually it will be adopted as legal tender, if not deliberately by fiat at inception already.
The money, out of all exchanged things, is THE most exchanged thing. And this quality is what makes it the money above all other qualities. If you hear a pundit, professor or politician say anything to the contrary, ignore them immediately to protect your household.
But The Money does not have to be adopted officially, per se. If government is no longer trusted enough, the money will simply emerge underground, as the new form of most exchanged thing. And will be used by the people just as effectively notwithstanding government power.
This is why the myth of the dangers of CBDC's are held so strongly by stupid people who neither think nor listen. If government control of the money is satisfactorily handled for the great mass of people, it will be accepted by the people, as the money no problem. If.
Imagine this: let us say that today a trillion transactions take place across the economies of the whole of the world. For each transaction, two people come together, both perfectly happy with the deal and in total agreement, to exchange one thing for another thing. For else the transaction will not take place! In 99.999% of these transactions(-1,000,000), money will have been the thing exchanged on one of the two sides. And the counter party who receives the money in exchange for whatever of the billion other kinds of things that get exchanged today, will say "Thank You!". Because they want the money to make a corresponding exchange for another kind of thing, that they really want more than the money, sometime later on.
So the money, is not wealth, as most people who have yet to think, believe. Money is not something which human exertion created, as is all of wealth. If people on the whole think money is wealth, can you imagine the chaos in policy making by their leaders, who always do exactly what the people want? And so it goes...
Analysed more closely, each of these trillion transactions that take place today, are really 'half-exchanges'. A full exchange is where 2 things which are not the money get completely exchanged across several trades. It is not the money we want. It is the things we can buy with the money that we really want. These 2 things we really want will always be material objects created by inputs of labour and capital or for skills and services rendered in the former - real world things which require exertion of some kind - the things we really really want. There are no exceptions to this golden rule. The money is just an idea - a very great idea. Sure, we create 'tokens' made of metal, paper and digits to give the idea of money the utility spoken of above - to 'oil' the trillion exchanges. A very big utility, probably the biggest utility of all. But these material world tokens are just a proxy for the idea of the money itself - tokens! The money is real, only in the psychic sense. It does not exist on earth. Just like God's will is not done on earth.
So the actuality is that the most exchanged form of token, rather than the most exchanged thing, is what becomes the money, in this time and place. Whatever form it takes in this time and place is irrelevant. All it needs is to be is the most exchanged token, to be the money.
If tomorrow, in our thought experiment, another class of things emerges which is used in 49.999% of transactions (leaving 50.001% of transactions made using the money) this will still not make it another form of the money. Because it will still not be the most exchanged thing, so will still not be accepted as the money, by the great mass of people. This new highly exchanged thing may do many other things, but the people will still not accept it as the money.
It doesn't matter what other qualities the pundits, professors and politicians demand about the money that it must have: metal; paper; crypto; ones and zeros; fresh air. If it's not the most exchanged thing, it is not the money.
Go Well!