From Thomas H Greco website Beyond Money, I found links to two videos giving a quick description of trade money not using conventional money such as Euros or Dollars. The first video is educational and has been developed by Paul Grignon and uses early city markets to explain the system. The second is promotional and describes a contemporary US trade money system, IMS. Videos are a great way of making what is really quite simple but obfuscated by the financial high priests of the current money system, simple again.
While I was on tour in western Canada recently, I had occasion to meet Paul Grignon, creator of the excellent videos, Money as Debt I and II. Paul came to my presentation on Salt Spring Island and brought with him a new short video called The Essence of Money, a Medieval Tale. In less than eight minutes, this video explains as well as anything I’ve seen how simple and effective a community-created currency can be. Highly recommended! View it here.
IMS is one of the leading trade exchange operators in the United States. It’s a publicly traded company that has in about 24 years grown from one local trade exchange into a network of more than a dozen trade exchanges scattered around North America. The IMS website contains a five minute video that does a pretty good job of explaining how commercial trade exchanges work. View it here.
Trade money is a great way of facilitating exchange between individuals in the free market. But money serves another rather distinct function – a medium of taxation. Trade money serves the function of paying taxes poorly because taxation is not a free market transaction. The choice of medium can be (and generally is) dictated by the government (serving private interests).
In a system where virtually all transactions have a tax implication (VAT, Labour taxes, Stamp Duty etc), the government will take its cut in its own choice of money, regardless of what the trading partners want. In fact, the government will become very anxious if the accounting is in a private trade money but the tax is in government money. What is the exchange rate to be? How can the government be sure it is not being ripped off? This is why governments are so opposed to barter – how do you track or even define the tax to be paid? Who is seller, who is buyer?
Grignon’s “Bread Vouchers” would be great in a free market, but for the time being, we’re stuck with using what the bankers and their government forces us to use. The solution is simple. Abolish taxes on production and exchange. The government should issue its own trade money redeemable against land values, just like any other producer/consumer.
The key to monetary reform is to understand exactly how the banking cartel and its government work together to force a deeply destabilising and harmful product on an unwilling public. Reform will not be easy.