Greed is good because the journey itself is the reward

“The journey not the arrival matters.” – T. S. Eliot 
Ever since Gordon Gecko's famous words 'Greed is Good', that phrase is used as a club to accuse bankers and other high paid finance professionals of being greedy, and putting their self interest ahead of society. Indeed, reading the articles on that theme, you would think that to aspire to earn money for the sake of it('greed') instead of just for fulfilling needs, is a crime. But in this post, I argue that for many of those money, greed is good because they see the process of earning money(trading, closing deals etc) as the reward in itself. It is like a game which you play for the fun of it, and get your high from winning certainly, but also from the game itself. To use the Olympic motto, the game is more important than winning! That may explain why billionaires/others work even when they have no monetary need to do so. While even other professionals can do so,  mostly only finance professionals can earn plenty early on to be able to afford to retire early on-hence this post focus on finance.

Without the greed, people would not compete actively in markets and may instead choose the easy way out of remaining small, setting up ventures in SME reserved areas etc. While the idealistic perspective would take the view that social service motto/greater good fuels entrepreneurs, the fact is that economic security is necessary before any such larger good. And to reach economic security, that is where a rational amount of greed works.