For the Love of Money

So Professor, here we are on the eve of our third anniversary of this blog. Changing the world turned out to be a pretty tall order, didn't it? Right up there with getting readers for a blog. :)

While doing some research for a post over on my own blog about the bikini and its effect on the male brain, (look for it Friday--the post not your brain) I ran across some interesting research being done at Berkley about the effect of wealth on people who have it. Or as it turned out in the study people who are even made to feel artificially as if they do. Here's the video compliments of PBS:

The study showed something that lots of folks suspect already: the rich think they have the right to play by a different set of rules, the ones they make or benefit them the most. They feel entitled. Those Wall Street raters you mentioned in your last post and the companies they work for aren't likely to feel the same pang of conscience during wrong doing that your average Joe might.

The study documented in this video seems to prove that the wealthy are less likely to stop for pedestrians at cross walks and more likely to take candy meant for children. A little trip around the internet shows much more research bolstering the idea that the rich are more likely to cheat and behave unethically in all kinds of situations. In the video I've posted here the journalist who is aware that he is part of an experiment exhibits the same pattern in his speech and demeanor as the students in the study who were unaware. So whatever is at play here is pretty powerful.

I'd be interested in knowing if this behavior is universal or tied to cultural influences like advertising , or a system like Capitalism. Historical actions of royalty, the wealthy, and those in power seem to show that it may be innate.  We can't fathom how the elites can ruin the environment for a little profit or outsource jobs to countries using slave labor.  We get surprised every few years when the local politician who seemed so honest on the campaign stump back home gets tangled up in some scandal once he gets to Washington. We scratch our heads and ask if it's in the water. We fail to grasp how the change that happens. In politics it's likely a power/money combination.

Is this what Jesus meant with all his cautions about wealth and the love of money? Is it why so many spiritual teachers shun materialism in their quest for the meaning of life? Is it why so many of us crave simplicity and associate it with a certain degree of goodness? Is the love of money the root of all evil, or at least a large portion of it?

And last of all, could it be the reason that the Occupy protestors felt such moral superiority huddled in their tents to stay warm? Is this just one of those things we all just know deep down inside?

And yet those lottery tickets just keep selling. We don't know to be careful what we wish for...