No.
The Joker’s original origin has him as the Red Hood, leader of the Red Hood gang. After a fight with Batman at a playing card company, he’s knocked into a vat of chemicals; his skin and hair are permanently altered in color. He’s not really THAT nuts, but he does have a major hate for Batman, and a criminal bent to begin with, as well as a knack for chemistry – even in his first appearance, he used his Joker poison (which kills while drawing the facial muscles into a horrible grin). His motivations had to do with profit, and irritating Batman, and creating a potent criminal reputation. Most importantly, his real name remains unknown.
In the post-TV-series period, he was retconned slightly; upon seeing his altered looks, he went totally crazy. Even insane, he is brilliant and lethal, able to invent the Joker venom, and continually alter the formula, so’s to keep Batman from producing an antivenom that will always work. His motivations become less predictable – sometimes, he’s in it for the money, other times he just wants to annoy or kill Batman. Again, we have no clue what his real name is.
During the eighties, in the post *Dark-Knight * period, *The Killing Joke * was published; in it, the Joker’s origin is again retconned. He is now a former chemist for a playing card company who quit his job to follow his dream of becoming a professional comedian; he’s failing badly, and is wracked with guilt for failing to support his pregnant wife, who nevertheless loves him very much.
Driven by desperation, he agrees to assist the Red Hood gang in robbing his former employer. In a horrible parody of the “no good very bad day,” his wife dies in a horrible/comical accident, his criminal cohorts are killed, and our hero is chased off a balcony by Batman, who thinks he’s the Red Hood; he plummets into a vat of chemicals and escapes… and sees his new face upon crawling from the river… and goes totally nuts.
This Joker has little or no interest in money or profit, except where necessary to fuel his other motivations, which are now more random and/or psychological; in The Killing Joke, he bought a carnival and had it refitted solely for the purpose of driving Commissioner Gordon insane. We still don’t know what the Joker’s real name is, but he remains vain, brilliant, and lethal.
It has since been said that the “comedian” story may or may not be the Joker’s true origin; the Joker himself has said that he doesn’t remember for sure, and that if he’s going to have a past, he’d like it to be “multiple choice! Hahahahaha!”
I don’t read much in the way of comics these days, but I’ve heard it said that the Riddler recently found out that the death of the Joker’s wife was not an accident, and that he knows who killed her. This would seem to add credence to the “comedian” story… but I don’t know for sure.
This seems mostly true NOW (sadly), but it certainly wasn’t always. I will agree with you that most cartoons these days have precisely that purpose, but they USED to be works of art that stood on their own merits. If, indeed, this current BATMAN cartoon is for the purpose that you allege, then it is a definite step down from the previous ones.