Socialism doesn't mean that money goes away. It means that your hard earned money is yours to spend how you please.
You're not forced to pay insane rent to line the pockets of a landlord, rather you live in a rent controlled neighbourhood where the profits go towards housing generations of people.
Another way the money you have is yours to spend how you see fit: Rewarding other people like you and I for running the local coffee shop or splurging for the D.O.P. San Marzano tomatoes at the grocery store and insert that money directly into your local economy.
Money exists, you just don't have to spend all of it on surviving. Rather, you can spend it on living.
You still make money based on your merit and input, grocery clerks aren't being paid the same as neurosurgeons but both people can spend the same basic amount every month on living.
I mean... Lawrence of Arabia was a real person and his story was quite well known. Written into a biographical account in 1926.
It's not a far stretch to think Herbert was inspired by those stories as well as those of the desert rats and fighting forces in the Africa campaigns of WW2, Conrad's heart of darkness and well... Yeah everything in human history up to that point.