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Re:What value do we create here? by albertsun on Monday April 05, 2010 @06:33PM (#1243291)
Things people want that aren't a means to get something else.

Burrito? Yes. Clothes? Yes. Art? Yes. Money? No. Liquidity? No.

Re:What value do we create here? by lionhearted on Monday April 05, 2010 @07:21PM (#1243370)
Liquidity provides mobility - there's been a couple times in my life that I'd have converted to any religion on the planet if their chief deity promised me a buyer at even half the market value of the asset I wanted to sell.

People don't want liquidity the same way they don't want a tune-up in their car. Nobody wants "a tune up", but people want a working auto that doesn't break down. No one wants liquidity, but a heck of a lot of people want to sell something they have so that they can get on with their life, move somewhere else, buy a new home, invest in something exciting, and so on. If you think freedom and mobility are valuable, then liquidity is valuable too - because liquidity can be very important in letting you do go where you want and do what you want when you have something important you need to sell or relinquish before moving on.

Re:What value do we create here? by joelhaus on Monday April 05, 2010 @09:15PM (#1243543)
This is patently absurd.

"Burritos" beget nourishment.

"Clothes" beget modesty.

"Art" begets pretension.

The irony here is that the liquidity provided by our financial system permits the use of money to acquire all of these things. It is this very liquidity that also permits the allocation of work to those with the best skill sets and solutions for the problems at hand.

I would add that (IMO) anything which diminishes suffering (in all forms) and increases compassion has value.

Re:What value do we create here? by wlievens on Tuesday April 06, 2010 @03:13AM (#1244080)
The overwhelming majority of jobs probably wouldn't classify as they're all creating intermediate products.