Times change, people change, the world advances, but the importance of money remains the same for everyone. You like it or you hate it. You either yearn for it or you fritter it away. But the one thing you cannot do is ignore it. This piece of printed paper has a complete hold on everyone’s life. The importance of money in our life is accurately expressed by Rebecca Johnson in 'Vogue'. She says, “Money is the opposite of the weather. Nobody talks about it, but everybody does something about it.”

Money has served as the medium of exchanging goods and services for more than 5000 years. Different people have adopted or adapted different forms of money all over the world. These forms offer an insight into the nature of money and the history of its use. We might presume that we are familiar with all forms of money but that would be presuming wrongly. For example, did you know that ‘axes’ were once used as money?



Even today, money is being preserved in a variety of monetary forms. Many banks and governments in the western world store their reserves as ingots of gold. With the evolution of light weighted paper notes, bank notes, cheque books to 21st century’s instant credit cards, man has always preferred convenient alternative spending-power. Modern technology has made it possible for us to live in a cashless society where plastic cards offer instant credit and money can be removed from bank accounts through telephone lines.

Functions of Money :

Money is used as the medium of exchanging goods/services and the means of payment. It is the store of value or wealth in accordance to the common belief that the form of money retains value over time. Loans and payments and deals are agreed to and contracted upon in terms of money. Money is considered as the best means of settling future accounts. It is referred as the liquid asset and is a causative factor as well as controller in the economy.