Cui deest pecunia, huic desunt omnia.
(Anonymous)

The one who lacks money, lacks everything.

(pron = Koo-ee DAY-ehst peh-KOO-nee-ah HOO-ik DAY-soont OHM-nee-ah)

Comment: Most of us have probably been raised with "money isn't everything".
Now, Anonymous would say "but if you don't have any, you lack everything".

It always strikes me when I hear the moralistic intonations of "money isn't
everything" that it is usually sung by those who have some money in the first
place.

Money is a means to social, economic, political, religious and cultural
discourse in our society, and it has been in human societies for a long time.
If one has no money, it means that for whatever of many reasons (some of which
go to the heart of social justice), then one really is locked out of life as we
know it. However, money is a symbol. Money is not direct experience, and when
we forget that (both people with and without money can forget or be ignorant of
this) then life becomes a shallow experience. Life gets reduced to money as if
money were a direct experience.

Money is never a direct experience. Money is always a symbol of some other
experiences. When your paycheck arrives (perhaps it just did this past week)
look at it for a moment (or look at the electronic deposit in your bank account
online--no better image of the symbolism of money and how this is not direct
experience). As you look at that paycheck, can you see it as a symbol of a
month full of direct experiences? As you write checks, can you see those
checks as a means of discourse between the work you did and the grocer, the
utility, the political party or religious or charitable organization, the club
you belong to, the doctor, etc?

Money is a symbol. It is not direct experience, but it is a symbol of direct
experience, a means to discourse. Those who don't have it, in this sense, have
nothing.