A pocketful of pigs

[1]Once there was no money.

[2]If people wanted to get something, they had to give something. This is the way it used to be.

[3]I will give you my cow for your pig, a man would say. I'll give you my bowl if you give me a shirt, another would say.

[4]Here are seven oranges for one fish.

[5]Will you give me a chicken for a bag of corn?

[6]people had to trade things every day. They had to give a thing to get a thing because there wasn't any money.

[7]But they had to work out a good trade, one that came out even.

[8]What could you get for two chickens? Were three bags of apples a good trade for two bags of grapes? Or one bag of apples for a little butter? What was an even trade? It was hard to know.

[9]And it was too hard to carry around all the things for trading. people had to use too much time getting things they needed. So they thought of a new way to trade.

[10]They thought of money.

[11]Money could stand for apples, or bowls, or pigs.

[12]And a pocketful of money was better than a pocketful of pigs.

[13]With money, it was not so hard to trade. Everyone could use money. The man who needed a pig could buy it with money. The man who sold the pig could keep the money until he needed something. people could work for money, and people buy things with the money they got from work.