Zelizer began by giving an interesting hypothetical, fast-forwarding to the year 2096. She gave the run-down, saying that most if not all money has taken an electronic form. She says that there has been a monetary value placed on most things, from spousal care, to children’s behavior, to strongly performing employees. However, the employer takes the employee out to dinner or offers them some lavish reward rather than actually giving them money.
The author questions the social ties we have to money, and predicted the reader’s response to things such as money for sexual favors and children needing to pay back their college tuition if it was paid for by parents. The social reaction to these scenarios is quite gut-wrenching, yet most of these things exist already. Prostitution is a business, some parents require their children to pay them back if the parents were responsible for paying the students college tuition, and there is most definitely electronic money now more than ever.
The way we think of money and financial transactions is highly socialized. Is there an objective standard to what money is and does, or is it simply a social construct? Zelizer certainly gives reasons why is may very well actually be the latter, pointing out how it is fungible, and can be given in the form of gifts. She also points out that the entire system of economics that we use today is simply built on a way that works for people, a very subjective system rather than an objective one.
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