Stewardship, consciousness, and the economics of care
Money is like a tool that can be used as a weapon or a shield. The tool itself is morally mute; the conscience and craft of its wielder determine whether it destroys or protects. That’s not a new thought—Aristotle called money a “measure” and a “mean,” valuable insofar as it orders exchange toward human purposes, not the other way around. Aquinas echoed him: money is “ordained to exchange,” and gains are just when they serve real needs and the common good. In other words, the question is never “money good or bad?” but “to what ends, by what means, and with what effects on others?”
This is where “consciousness” matters. People act from different levels of awareness: short-term impulse versus long-term stewardship, private gain versus shared flourishing. Kant would say the moral worth of an act turns on the maxim behind it—are we willing for everyone to act the same way? Aristotle would talk about phronēsis, practical wisdom: seeing what is good for humans here and now and choosing well within constraints. When money sits in the hands of practical wisdom, it becomes a lever for freedom; when it sits in the hands of appetite alone, it becomes an accelerant for harm.
Playing the game of economy—consciously
Adam Smith insisted that wealth is not piles of coins but “the annual produce of the land and labour of the society,.” or of a person (grandparent) Money’s highest use is to coordinate effort so that more families eat, learn, and age with dignity. A job is not just income; it’s access to benefits—health insurance, disability coverage, paid leave, pensions and 401(k)s—that spread risk across time. Weber observed how organized, disciplined enterprise can turn vocation into durable institutions; Sen reframed development as expanding people’s capabilities—the real freedoms they can actually exercise. Thoughtful participation in markets expands those capabilities.
At the neighborhood scale this shows up as the “duplicated dollar”: the contractor you hire pays a framer, who pays a grocer, who hires a clerk, whose family pays a dentist. Bastiat urged us to see both “what is seen and what is not seen”: wages and invoices are visible; the second-order stability—kids with shoes, elders with medicine—is easy to miss. The phenomenon economists call the local multiplier is a moral one, too: each cycle of spending can carry a little more dignity if we design for it.
Real estate: where ideals meet ground
Real estate makes these abstractions concrete. Land, code, and capital are hard edges; within them, you either extract or you create. A firm like Armenta Realty that takes an uninhabitable structure and turns it into a home is doing several things at once:
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mobilizing a chain of work (demo crews, subs, suppliers, inspectors, lenders, closers);
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transferring a high-quality asset to a family whose future net worth, stability, and health outcomes improve with tenure;
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raising neighboring values and safety if done with care (and avoiding displacement when possible);
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modeling craft pride—“good work done well”—which Arendt saw as foundational to civic life.
Jane Jacobs would applaud the fine-grained, human-scaled improvements that knit streets back together. Henry George would remind us that land value rises from the surrounding community; therefore owners owe that community ethical stewardship—habitable standards, fair dealing, transparency. Elinor Ostrom would add that local rules and norms matter: how you contract, how you hire, how you share information changes outcomes.
“Money is the root of all evil”? Not quite.
The familiar phrase misquotes the source: the text says “the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.” Love, misdirected—treating means as ends—corrupts. Money itself is a vector. Spinoza would call it a power of acting—a capacity that can be moved by reason or passion. Nietzsche warns that resentment twists power into cruelty; Maimonides ranks giving someone a livelihood (a job, a partnership) as among the highest forms of charity. The through-line: the moral center is the person, not the instrument.
Why there are no entirely self-made millionaires
We speak loosely of “self-made,” but Smith’s division of labor shows that output is always cooperative—no builder forges their own rebar, drafts their own title policy, or paves their own streets. Hayek reminds us that market order marshals dispersed knowledge; every profitable decision stands on information created by others. Rawls would press the point further: fair institutions—courts, schools, safety nets—lower the background risk that makes entrepreneurship feasible. Even Nozick, defender of strong property rights, starts from just transfer within a structure of rules and protection others maintain.
Look back at any so-called self-made ascent and you’ll see a lattice: mentors, crews, customers, suppliers, public inspectors, line workers, and the quiet solidarity of family and friends. Vision matters—someone must choose, risk, and persist—but equity in the ascent is social: credit, gratitude, and, where possible, shared upside.
Ambition as stewardship
Ambition has a better name when it is accountable to the future. If you can “duplicate a dollar” into many livelihoods, you have both blessing and duty. In housing, that duty can look like:
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Good work: safety first, durable materials, honest scopes, and warranties that mean something.
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Good wages & benefits: apprenticeships, prompt pay, and benefits that stabilize families (health, PTO, retirement matches).
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Good neighbors: transparency with blocks, mitigating displacement, hiring locally where feasible, and keeping price-quality honest.
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Good exits: selling homes that are energy-efficient, code-tight, and financeable; educating buyers about long-run upkeep so today’s joy becomes tomorrow’s security.
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Good governance: clean books, fair contracts, and compliance that reduces downstream externalities.
Done this way, growing beyond the local economy isn’t empire-building—it’s scale in the service of capabilities. More sites mean more crews on payroll, more kids with shoes, more retirees with pensions that last.
Conscious capital in practice (the Armenta example)
When Armenta Realty rehabilitates a derelict property, it doesn’t just generate margin; it multiplies agency:
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A drywaller gets steady weeks, qualifies for health coverage, and accumulates hours toward retirement.
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A young family buys a structurally sound, efficient home—likely their largest asset—and gains the stability that compounds into college options, business starts, and intergenerational wealth.
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A block regains safety and pride; the tax base funds schools and parks; nearby owners reinvest.
That is what it means for money to function like a shield: it protects rights and expands horizons, especially against forces—ignorance, predation, chaos—that erode human life and long-term effects.
Closing: the beautiful game
It’s not the love of money, and it isn’t the fetish of having a lot of it. It’s the craft of turning means into shared ends—of building a micro-economy that lets people stand straighter. Join the “game of economy” with phronēsis and courage: make payroll on time, overbuild integrity, teach buyers about maintenance and equity, and keep widening the circle that participates in the gains. The joy, as you put it, is creating housing and employment—not only for the short-term checks that keep lights on, but for the long arc of security that lets people read to their kids in peace.
Money is not the root of all evil. And there are no entirely self-made millionaires. There are only persons—some more awake, some less—choosing what to do with power. Choose to steward it. Multiply the dollar and the dignity that rides with it.
