By Katie Winterburn
From Warren Buffet to your Uncle Jim to the Bible, every person and culture has a different perspective on money. For some people it’s a tool to make investments or a reward for a hard day’s work. For others, money defines their self-worth, self-image, and success. And how much is enough? Can you ever have enough?
Whatever your unique perspective is, there’s no denying that money has the power to influence your and your family’s lives. And clearly your conceptions about the true value of money spill over to affect things like your ability to maintain a work-life balance, and less tangible things like your ability to be happy and satisfied.
This means that our ideas about money matter almost as much as the amount of money in our bank accounts. Learning about different people’s perspectives on what money is, its true value, and how other people make and use their money will open your mind to new ways of thinking about, making, and using your own money.
Without further ado, here’s a list of 10 free online documentaries for your viewing, educating, and mind-altering pleasure.
1. How to Win the Loser’s Game
This 82-minute documentary provides insight into how to properly invest your money and come out on top of the investing game.
2. Influencers
This 14-minute documentary provides a brief insight into how trends and ideas catch on and become relevant in modern society. This documentary also looks at how people become “effective influencers.” Hint: being an influencer can make you $$!
3. How to Buy Nukes On the Black Market
This eye-opening documentary looks at how easy it is to buy weapons of mass destruction if you have enough money. We know that money can buy you power, but can it buy you the ability to change the course of history?
4. How to Buy Happiness
This 11-minute TED Talk by Michael Norton breaks down how money can actually give you a happier life.
5. Steve Jobs: Biography
This doc gives a special look at the influence Steve Jobs had on technology, film, and culture during his lifetime. How did he manage to achieve what he did? What drove him to exceed everyone’s goals and expectations? Was he driven by money- or by something else?
6. When Bankers Were Good
Get historical and take a look at bankers and financial professionals during the Victorian era. Unlike the greed and other negatives we may associate with bankers today, during this time there were more important priorities outside of the bottom line. What were they? What changed?
7. The End of Poverty?
This 105-minute documentary takes an in-depth look at the way that history has shaped the global poverty crisis we’re facing today. This is not a crisis that developed overnight, and there is definitely a solution — so why are billions of people still living in poverty today? What do governments and society have to gain by keeping so many people on the bottom?
8. The Dark Side of Chocolate
What do child labor, trafficking, and other horrifying abuses have to do with your sweet tooth? In 2001, the shocking discovery was made that cacao farms house all of this and more. What’s happened to the chocolate industry since these shocking discoveries were made? What has changed? What laws and regulations have come in to play since we found out the real cost of a chocolate bar?
9. Daylight Robbery
This hour-long documentary takes a look at the finances and assets that have been miscalculated and lost throughout the West’s tumultuous relationship with Iraq. Has more money been spent than the public is aware of? Where is it going? Do our governments even even have a clue?
10. Not Business as Usual
This question-raising and provocative hour-long documentary takes a deeper look at the actual costs and outcomes of capitalism. How can a society that answers to the shareholder truly consider itself free and prosperous? What costs are we really paying?
It can be easy go about your daily business using cash and credit to buy things and never give a thought to the true value of money and the myriad cons and consequences it inspires. But the truth is that everything in our lives is somehow tied to money, and it pays to be informed.
Your dollar is your power — so it’s essential that you understand how to use this power to get yourself ahead and for the betterment of the world around you.
Esther Trattner