As Beatrice Kaufman said, "I've been poor and I've been rich. Rich is better."
I've been struggling financially most of my life; worried about the mortgage, about bills, about educating my kids, taking care of my husband in his last days, some days just trying to figure out how to feed five kids on three boxes of mac and cheese while trying to decide whether it will be cheaper to let the electricity get shut off or the gas, because it was less expensive to pay the fees to get one turned back on than the other.
I have absolutely no patience for people who go on and on about the moral joys of poverty. I HAVE noticed that the only people who do that are those who don't really have a clue what it's like to be poor.
I would so much rather be wealthy, with my problems being which charity to hand over my excess funds to, than dealing with that.
If I had a chance to be wealthy enough to pay off the mortgage, get my oldest daughter and her husband a house to live in so they don't have to live with me, and my brother a place to live so HE doesn't have to live with me, to hire someone to help me take care of my parents, and get a car that would allow me to take said parents to their appointments in some comfort, trust me, I wouldn't turn the opportunity down.
AND I would buy Coach handbags (the one my daughters gave me for Christmas two years ago still looks new!) and shop somewhere other than WalMart for my clothes, and I wouldn't feel one bit guilty for doing so.
There is nothing immoral about having money. The immorality comes in what one does with it, and whether one confuses the means to obtain things with character.