Greed Essay

Greed Essay

Greed is one of the most controversial yet debatable topics that reside in the domain of psychology. It is defined as ‘an overwhelming desire to have more of something such as money than is actually needed’ (HelpMe, 2000). This definition implies simplicity to the word, but the views of psychologists are diverse.

On a personal level, greed makes people devious, petty, unlovable and very jealous. That is because on this level, an individual’s main focus would be to obtain more money. In order to achieve that, a normal job on a normal office day won’t make the cut. That is why he/she will have to come up with different ways to earn a higher living. In the same vein, there will be much lying, cheating, backstabbing and suffering as there needs to be until they obtain their needs.  Thomas Aquinas says that greed "is a sin against God, just as all mortal sins, in as much as man condemns things eternal for the sake of temporal things."(Knight,2016).

Greed is all around us. We are constantly bombarded with examples in the corporate world, in sports, in the courtroom, in the political arena, and in our own daily lives involving people that we know and deal with on a social level. Some would say that greed is the leading motivating factor in our society, so it’s not a stretch for it to be the leading motivating force behind a company or an organization. When you have people in charge whose only purpose is to enrich themselves by any means possible, disregarding others, you have the basis of a corrupt and greedy business. For example, the website www.opseu.org reported of a married couple in Toronto being wanted on charges of fraud to the tune of 12 million dollars in connection to a privately held health clinic that the husband chaired and co-founded.

Above all, I think that greed is a negative force that no one wants to be associated with and is the epitome of the factors that will lead to the downfall of the society.