Yesterday I visited a certified organic vineyard in Montilla, Córdoba, where his director, Francisco Robles, walked me through, in detail, how their wine is made — with care not only for the land and the environment, but also for the people and culture around it. It was a clear reminder of the common wealth that thoughtful enterprise can create.
As lawyers and advisers, we often operate in binary terms — numbers, contracts, outcomes. But we should spend more time on the ground, connecting those figures to what they really mean — and to the people they’re meant to serve.
What I Saw in Montilla
Bodegas Robles is a family business that’s been around for over 100 years. They make wine, but that’s only part of the story. They look after the land, pay people fairly, and run activities that bring the community together — film festivals, concerts, school visits.
They’re not chasing headlines. They’re simply doing things well. And they’re making it work — not with billions in the bank, but with a business that supports a good number of people and does it in a way that respects the place they live in.
What We Still Count
Globally, wealth is still measured in currency — dollars, euros, rupees — as if the only thing that matters is what we can count. It’s an old way of thinking, but we still use it.
The Romans called it pecunia numerata — money that could be weighed and counted. The word pecunia itself comes from pecus, meaning livestock, one of the earliest forms of wealth. Even now, we assign value to what can be tallied and stored — as if what we cannot measure does not matter.
Let’s think about it. We’re all caught in the same mindset.
In 2024, the 19 richest families in the U.S. made $1 trillion — more than the GDP of Switzerland. They now hold $2.6 trillion, roughly the same as the bottom half of the U.S. population. These figures are repeated around the world. In Europe, the top 10% own 67% of the wealth, while the bottom half hold just 1.2%. In India, the top 1% hold over 40% of all wealth. In the UK, the top 1% own as much as the bottom 50% combined (FT).
But, what wealth really measures?
The word wealth comes from Old English wela, meaning well-being or welfare, first recorded around the 13th century. It is closely related to weal, a word still found in phrases like “commonweal,” meaning the common good.
Before wealth came to mean material riches, it referred more broadly to a state of health, happiness, and prosperity.
By the late Middle Ages, especially in the 14th and 15th centuries, its meaning began to shift towards possessions and financial resources.
But the original sense reminds us: true wealth was never just about money — it was about living well and contributing to the well-being of others.
The simplest question
As de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince (1943), reminds us:
“Grown-ups like numbers. When you tell them about a new friend, they never ask about the important things.
They never ask: ‘What does his voice sound like? What games does he love?’
They ask: ‘How old is he? How much does he weigh? How much money does his father make?’”
What I saw in Montilla was a reminder that not all wealth is financial. Some of it is harder to measure — but more important. And we should be doing more to notice and support those who are building things that last, even if they don’t make front-page news.
So here’s the question I keep coming back to:
Are we doing enough to back the people who are getting it right — quietly, honestly, and with others in mind?
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