How to Start a Community Currency. “Banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies...The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.
" - Thomas Jefferson “Let me issue and control a nation’s money and I care not who writes the laws.” - Banker Mayer Amschel Rothschild The centralized creation of money and credit has a profoundly negative effect on local economies, sovereignty, and social cohesion. Bankers value profit at all costs, while locally-controlled institutions tend to hold other values - like community, justice and sustainability - more highly. Communities can regain control of the flow of money and credit by issuing their own currency as a complement to conventional money, as electronic barter networks, debit cards, mobile phone payments, Timebanks, LETS, or old-fashioned cash. By altering the flow of resources, community currencies take power away from multinationals and put it in the hands of more accountable local entities.
Bangla-Pesa: Kenyan community currency faces legal action. Bangla-Pesa is a community currency used in the settlement of Bangladesh in Kenya.
The currency is only used among roughly 200 small businesses which are members of a community group. The projects co-founder, Will Ruddick, describes Bangla-Pesa as “a business to business voucher system and simply helps business record their exchange of excess capacity, … which provides a means of payment that is complementary to official money.” The currency drew the suspicions of local police late last month after a news report linking the currency to a Kenyan separatist group, Mombasa Republican Council or MRC. Ruddick responded to this claim saying “Ours is a noble cause of helping the locals and not what was reported in the media last week, … We are not MRC and we do not support any cause of going against the government’s wish.” Welcome to The Creative Exchange Time Bank- A Creative Exchange Lab initiative. Print Your Own Money. The economy is big news, and a big worry.
But there are as many economies as we need. There are global, national, regional, and neighborhood economies. Give & Get Free Stuff - Listia.com Auctions for Free Stuff. A REconomy exchange system for the future? As a new kind of local economy emerges, what might be a vision for an exchange system that would best support it?
Here’s Gary Alexander’s thinking, an idea that combines the features of a gift economy and community exchange with complementary currencies and our aspirational characteristics for Transition Enterprises… The problem we face now is that would-be Transition Enterprises find themselves in the existing business market, with all of its competitive and financial pressures. Those are often in conflict with these aspirational characteristics, even if the enterprises desire them.
Value for People. How to Start a Community Currency. Proposal For the Introduction Of Natural Money. Author: Bart klein Ikink The choice During the Great Depression the Austrian town of Wörgl introduced scrip money.
The faster circulation of scrip within the local economy increased trade and created extra employment. Crowdfunding the commons. The Social Coin is a NGO fully dedicated to producing and distributing coins that initiate chains of random acts of kindness, which can be followed and measured.
How does it work? 1. When handling a coin, think about the act of kindness you're going to do. Emissions Reduction Currency System. Emissions Reduction Currency Systems (ERCS) are schemes that provide a positive economic and or social reward for reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, either through distribution or redistribution of national currency or through the publishing of coupons, reward points, social currency, or complementary currency.
Compared to other emissions reductions instruments[edit] Ven (currency) Ven (sign: VEN) is a global digital currency traded in international financial markets and originally used by members of a social network service, Hub Culture, to buy, share, and trade knowledge, goods, and services.
The value of Ven is determined on the financial markets from a basket of currencies, commodities and carbon futures.[2] It trades against major currencies at floating exchange rates. LMAX reported at the end of the first week of trading that over 14 million Ven had traded on the exchange, increasing Ven liquidity by 30%.[3] Ithaca Hours. The Ithaca HOUR is a local currency used in Ithaca, New York and is the oldest and largest local currency system in the United States that is still operating.[1][not in citation given] It has inspired other similar systems in Madison, Wisconsin; Corvallis, Oregon;[2] and a proposed system in the Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania.[3] One Ithaca HOUR is valued at US$10 and is generally recommended to be used as payment for one hour's work, although the rate is negotiable.
BerkShares. BerkShares is a local currency that circulates in The Berkshires region of Massachusetts.
It was launched on September 29, 2006[1] by BerkShares Inc., with research and development assistance from the New Economics Institute. The BerkShares website lists over 370 businesses in Berkshire County that accept the currency.[2] In 30 months, 2.2 million BerkShares have been issued from 12 branch offices of five local banks.[3] The bills were designed by John Isaacs[4] and are printed by Excelsior Printing on special paper with incorporated security features from Crane & Co..[5] BerkShares are pegged with an exchange rate to the US dollar, but Nick Kacher of the New Economics Institute has discussed the possibility of pegging its value to a basket of local goods in order to insulate the local economy against volatility in the US economy.[6] Use[edit] BerkShares are a local currency designed and issued for the Berkshire region of Massachusetts. Denominations[edit] Create your Time Bank site. Time Banks Community Directory. Time banking. In economics, a time-based currency is an alternative currency where the unit of exchange is the person-hour.
Some time-based currencies value everyone’s contributions equally: one hour equals one service credit. In these systems, one person volunteers to work for an hour for another person; thus, they are credited with one hour, which they can redeem for an hour of service from another volunteer. Critics charge that this would lead to fewer doctors or dentists. Other systems, such as Ithaca Hours, let doctors and dentists charge more hours per hour. Time-based currency. Community Exchange System. The Community Exchange System (CES) is an Internet-based trading network[1] which allows participants to buy and sell goods and services without using a national currency. While the relatively new system can be used as an alternative to traditional currencies such as the dollar or Euro or South African rand, the Community Exchange System is a complementary currency in the sense that it functions alongside established currencies.
Local exchange trading system. A local exchange trading system (also local employment and trading system or local energy transfer system; abbreviated to LETS or LETSystem) is a locally initiated, democratically organised, not-for-profit community enterprise that provides a community information service and record transactions of members exchanging goods and services by using the currency of locally created LETS Credits.[1] History[edit] Michael Linton originated the term "local exchange trading system" in 1983 and for a time ran the Comox Valley LETSystems in Courtenay, British Columbia.[2] The system he designed was intended as an adjunct to the national currency, rather than a replacement for it,[3] although there are examples of individuals who have managed to replace their use of national currency through inventive usage of LETS.
[citation needed] Mutual credit. Mutual credit is a type of alternative currency in which the currency used in a transaction can be created at the time of the transaction. LETS are mutual credit systems. Typically this involves keeping track of each individual's credit or debit balance. Although the effect is like a loan, no interest is charged, and since mutual credit allows for trading and cancelling balances with others, debts can be paid off indirectly. Local currency. See Emissions Reduction Currency System for community based initiatives aimed at emission reduction In economics, a local currency, in its common usage, is a currency not backed by a national government (and not necessarily legal tender), and intended to trade only in a small area. As a tool of fiscal localism, local moneys can raise awareness of the state of the local economy, especially among those who may be unfamiliar or uncomfortable with traditional bartering.
Complementary currency. Private currency. Alternative currency. Virtual economy.
Theories & movements. WIR Bank. WIR Bank logo The WIR Bank, formerly the Swiss Economic Circle (GER: Wirtschaftsring-Genossenschaft), or WIR, is an independent complementary currency system in Switzerland that serves businesses in hospitality, construction, manufacturing, retail and professional services. WIR Bank. Ijccr-2011-ruddick. Complementary Currencies. Community Currencies help strengthen the economic roots of a community so that it can weather inflation, economic slumps and external market competition. Complementary Currencies (CCs) bring a radical change to how we think about sustainable development. We give Your Community a Place to Thrive.
Credibles by Slow Money – Prepaid Crowdfunding for local food businesses. The MetaCurrency Project. Real Change News. January 18, 2012 Vol: 19 No: 3 Interview by: , Assistant Editor From our cashless past, author Charles Eisenstein finds future solutions By ROSETTE Assistant Editor Want to know how to make more money in 2012? Perhaps it is, if you subscribe to Forbes Magazine. Introducing the plan. Welcome to the Community Exchange System. A Day in the Life of a Berkshare: How a Regional Currency Works by Bill McKibben.
What’s it really like to deal in regional currency? Posted Oct 18, 2010 Want to encourage the local economy? Try printing your own regional money. In Great Barrington, Massachusetts, I gave the nice man in the Mr. Ding a Ling truck a W.E.B. Also waiting was Susan Witt, the force behind America's most successful alternative currency. The sheer power of money—the fact that you can use it to command someone in China to do something for you—can create problems just as it solves them. Money, when you think about it, is hard to explain. Www.baybucks.org. How We Fix It. What We Need We’ve spent the last four years researching the problems caused by the current debt-based monetary system and how to fix them.
Time Banking + Gift Economy.