In treating people as less important than things, work becomes both demoralised and demoralising and we become blind to the moral content of our decisions.. Money and wilfful blindness make us act in ways incompatible wiht what believe our ethics to be, and often even with our own self-interest..the problem with money isn't fundamentally about greed, although it can be comforting to think so. The problem with money is that we live in societies in which mutual support and co-operation is essential, but money erodes the relationships we need to lead productive, fulfilling and genuinely happy lives. When money becomes the dominant behavior, it doesn't cooperate with, or amplify, our relationships; it disengages us from them. . Margaret Heffernan
About This Quote

In treating people as less important than things, work becomes both demoralised and demoralising and we become blind to the moral content of our decisions. If work is more important than everything else in a person's life, then how do you treat people? What kind of relationships might you have? How would your work be different? One of the main reasons that money becomes a problem for people is that the more money a person has, the less important those around them become. It's as if the more money someone has, the less capable they are of understanding what it means to be human. This is because money is indifferent to human life.

The way we use it confuses us. It is not selfish to use money to help others - it is selfless and encourages us to sacrifice ourselves for others - it is selfish to be so driven by greed that we can't see that we are becoming insensitive and cruel by using money as a way of measuring our worth.

Source: Willful Blindness: Why We Ignore The Obvious At Our Peril

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More Quotes By Margaret Heffernan
  1. When we care about people, we care less about money, and when we care about money, we care less about people.
  2. Money is just one of the forces that blind us to information and issues which we could pay attention to - but don't. It exacerbates and often rewards all the other drivers of willful blindness; our preference for the familiar, our love for individuals and...
  3. In treating people as less important than things, work becomes both demoralised and demoralising and we become blind to the moral content of our decisions.. Money and wilfful blindness make us act in ways incompatible wiht what believe our ethics to be, and often even...
  4. You cannot fix a problem that you refuse to acknowledge.
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