5: Money as an Economic Good
Goods are generally divided into consumption goods (used to satisfy human needs) or production goods (used to create consumption goods). Money is clearly not a consumption good, but it does not easily fit the description of a production good, though most economists do so out of convenience.
Some economists regard money as a "medium of exchange" - which is either a third class of economic goods, or something that is not an economic good at all. When we work for a wage, we are not interested in the wage itself, but the goods that the wage will enable us to obtain in exchange for our work. Hence the two exchanges of "work for money" and "money for goods" translates into an exchange of "work for goods."
However, this is not held true of other commodities that may be used as money. If a man trades oats for barley, then barley for corn, he has engaged in two economic actions, not a single action with a commodity as a medium of exchange. As such, to declare money to be a non-good that is removed from consideration is to ignore actual behavior, disqualifying the conclusion of any such consideration from practical application.
(EN: There's a fair amount of consideration of this topic, probably to demonstrate that Von Mises had not failed to consider other theories of his time, which I am skipping over.)
Money is to be considered "dead stock", in that it has no practical application for anything other than engaging in trade for other goods. Any increase or decrease in the supply of money does nothing to improve the economic welfare of the market as would the change in value of almost every other good, both production or consumption.
Money as Private Capital
Another question to be considered is whether money is capital.
Capital, itself is a notion that is subject to differing definitions, but is generally regarded to be a factor of production that is not itself consumed by the process of production (it is not an ingredient or component of the good that is produced) - or, more specifically, to the acquisition of goods.
To clarify: land is regarded as capital, as it is used in the activity of farming to produce an array of agricultural goods, but the land itself remains intact even after the goods are produced and removed from it. As such, land is regarded as a capital resource, not a production good.
Money, in itself, can also be used to generate profit in the absence of goods, such as a loan to be repaid with interest. In this sense, money can produce profit without producing any physical good. To return to the comparison of land, loaning money can be seen as analogous to "loaning" your land to another to farm, in exchange for a portion of the harvest.
Even in more typical production, money is not a part of the product that is eventually brought to market, nor is the money consumed in the process of production. Money may be used to purchase items necessary to production (materials, machinery, labor, etc.) but it is not by this process destroyed, merely passed on to another holder.
Money is am instrument of acquisition only when it is exchanged for some other good - that is, it has no value as a medium of exchange except by the virtue of being used. It can likewise be argued that money that is "idle," produces no fruit, and does not become "capital" until it is invested in the pursuit of production.
Money as Social Capital
Neither can money, in and of itself, be included in the notion of social capital. Just as it is not productive as private capital until it is put to use, neither is there any societal benefit to any quantity of "idle" money.
(EN: This is also a refutation of other theories, the details of which seem incidental.)