Recommended reading.
A History of Money
From Ancient Times to the Present Day
By Glyn Davies
Money aside, I still maintain “wealth” is created only by organized, productive human activity, or “work.”
Without work, nothing happens.
That's not only absolutely true but it's something not very widely understood.
If a guy has a home worth $100K then his net worth (wealth) is $100k. If he mortgages the place and takes out a $100K loan then he has $100K in the bank plus zero home equity. The bank created $100K in money and no wealth is created (outside the value of the services rendered). Of course once the guy uses the money to say, expand the business then we got real wealth creation, which was all made possible by the creation of that 'wealth-less' money.
“I still maintain “wealth” is created only by organized, productive human activity, or “work.”
Absolutely. Even so called natural wealth (oil, gold, timber, whatever) ain’t worth a plug nickel until somebody puts the work into bringing it in a usable form.