I've never been a big fan of economic determinism. I don't see why we should privilege the desire for wealth as somehow more real, more fundamental, than other motivations. It's a legacy of Marx, I guess, to think of non-economic factors as a superstructure, as something that in the end is only an outgrowth or mask for materialist factors. I don't see it. Religion, nationalism, power - personal or collective - all seem to me to be quite powerful forces. When it comes to understanding behaviour, real is whatever people believe to be so. Then again all such motivations overlap with one another.