ENGL 200 D: Reading Literature: Literature in the Marketplace

My name is Becca and I just finished freshman year at the UW. I am thinking of being an English major. I like to read.

Money is everything you need to live. Money is not necessarily a measure of how hard you have worked, but it is for better or for worse a measure of how much a person is worth. Some people  toil away endlessly at dead end jobs and may only barely be worth enough to live, if they are lucky. Their lives may be products of unfortunate circumstance or personal choice, but this changes nothing. It is impossible to tell the difference on the outside.

Others are born with better luck. They can blow all their money and never work a day in their lives, but because of who their parents are/ their social standing, they can expect to lead comfortable lives. They are usually seen as more deserving, especially in our capitalist culture, because how well dressed a person is = their social standing = respectability.

If money is used to distribute how much fortune & happiness each person gets, the economy is how much of that there is to go around for everyone. In a bad economy, the value of money is lower because there is less to go around. When the economy is bad, everyone suffers. When it is good, everyone is happier. The economy effects people collectively, whereas the distribution of money effects individuals. Still, bad economies effect people unevenly- those at the very top might notice little difference. This can be the difference between having to sell a third car and having to donate an extra kidney to pay rent.

Calvin would love this.