Hobney not Money: A Community or Local Currency Type Solution for Economic Problems
The solution to the economic problem that catches my mind's attention the most these days, would involve the use of credit card technology, so as to promote balanced high velocity internal circulation of a type of money. This 'money' would exist in terms of numbers in computers that worked in combination with credit-card-like cards. This special type of 'money' would have to be spent on purchasing goods and services whose production involved the use of limited or zero amounts of imports. For now I shall refer to this special type of money as 'hobney'.
Under this system, a person would be paid 'hobney'; the hobney he/she was paid would manifest itself in an internet web page; the person paid the hobney would be able to spend it using a card like a credit card. The hobney paid the person would be of various types: hobney that has to be spent on food, hobney that has to be spent on housing, hobney that has to be spent on clothing, hobney that has to be spent on transportation, hobney that has to be spent on medical care, hobney that has to be spent on education, hobney that has to be spent on recreation.
Looking at the pay that a person would receive for work under this system, the percentage of the total hobney paid a worker for an hour's wages that is of the type that can only be spent on for example food, would be set by observing the amount of production and employment generated by the food sector (not dependent on imports) that hobney could be used to purchase from. Same for the percentage of the total hobney paid to a worker that could be spent on housing, clothing, transportation, medical care, education, and recreation. Another determinant of these percentages would be analysis re what is good for a person, what percentage of total spending going to say housing is optimal for a person's well-being, and what percentage of total economic resources persons desire to devote to various types of expenditures.
The hobney would have to be spent purchasing from the various sectors eligible to sell to those using hobney to purchase, within a given amount of time. For example, if Leroy received a certain amount of food credits, after a certain amount of time, if Leroy did not spend those food credits, the value of the food credits would begin to decline. This would establish an incentive leading to a high velocity of circulation of the hobney. A faster circulation of the hobney from sector to sector would result in higher income, sales, production, and consumption in a given amount of time.
At this point I tend to favor the establishment of several local clusters across the nation; a worker getting paid hobney by a sector in one of the se clusters, would have to spend the hobney buying from sectors in his own local cluster. Seems to me that this would work better than say one big cluster for the entire nation which would allow a worker paid hobney in Boston to buy from a food sector eligible to sell food in exchange for hobney in California.
As of now I tend to favor say one hundred hobney clusters across the nation as opposed to one big national hobney circuit because: this being a relatively new untried approach, with many local clusters, good methods learned in the best clusters could be transferred to the less competent clusters; incompetence in a given cluster would not infect the other clusters; corruption would be easier to contain given the use of lots of local clusters; local clusters would promote more innovation and creativity, more producing- gardens-out-of-desert type activity than one big national cluster; lots of local clusters would increase the amount of innovation and education produced by the hobney system; a system featuring lots of local clusters would be much more resilient in the face of productivity impairing disasters than other clusters; the velocity of the hobney as it moved from sector to sector (clothing to transportation for example) would be greater with local clusters as opposed to one big national cluster.
If the hobney dream came true, I would appoint a panel of experts to advise me, especially with regards to facets of the hobney implementation problem that I am not sure about yet. For example, a worker might get paid one unit of housing hobney per hour, and he might want to use this housing hobney to purchase a tent that costs 100 housing hobney units. Various alternatives develop: the worker might not be able to take possession of the tent until he had paid the 100 housing hobney units in full; or, the worker might be able to take possession of the tent after paying 10 housing hobney units, the way people buy a car on credit, the other 90 housing hobney units being paid off while he had possession of the tent; or the choice in the matter could be left up to the individuals involved. Then there is the question of to what extent it should be possible to bank and to loan hobney units. Which of such various alternatives is the best, depends on pros and cons of the various alternatives, pros and cons that have to balanced against each other; it is too much to expect that I by myself should make all these balancing judgements; I by myself would not be as competent making such judgements, compared to I combined with a panel of experts.
The nation now is faced with restrictive free trade agreements. A hobney economy running parallel to the traditional international money economy, might possibly minimize offense against such trade agreements and against the aspirations of foreign nations.
Judging from what I know of the American character, the faults and strong points of American people, Americans would fit in well with a hobney type of system. Americans can be surprisingly good at mechanical skills. Producing things, inventing things, repairing things--these are activities that Americans are good at and that Americans enjoy.
The era we live in now is characterized by the presence of the internet, which was not used by most people just ten years ago but now is used by most people. I believe that the presence of the internet, which allows for free, complex, sophisticated communication between persons, means that a hobney type system would succeed much better than it would have in the pre-internet days.
This is all based upon the philosophy of economics that most attracts me at the present time, a philosophy which I consider to by my own original economic philosophy (I realize others who have not communicated with me may have come up with similar ideas independently) which is: economic growth is produced be balanced increases in the internal velocity of money combined with judicious increases in the money supply (balanced here means, for example, not too much or too little being spent by consumers on any one sector, sectors being food, housing, clothing, transportation, medical care, education, recreation, and perhaps other sectors not mentioned here).
A problem faced by any scheme designed to improve the lives of persons materially and spiritually, is that there exist individuals who are devoted to damaging the material and spiritual lives of persons. How to deal with such malicious individuals is important, but beyond the scope of the subject matter dealt with here. For now all I can say is that perhaps the malicious types would be less malicious if they considered how they themselves and their own families, would be better off if the people around them were well fed, well housed, well clothed, well educated, etc etc.
@2008 David Virgil Hobbs
Under this system, a person would be paid 'hobney'; the hobney he/she was paid would manifest itself in an internet web page; the person paid the hobney would be able to spend it using a card like a credit card. The hobney paid the person would be of various types: hobney that has to be spent on food, hobney that has to be spent on housing, hobney that has to be spent on clothing, hobney that has to be spent on transportation, hobney that has to be spent on medical care, hobney that has to be spent on education, hobney that has to be spent on recreation.
Looking at the pay that a person would receive for work under this system, the percentage of the total hobney paid a worker for an hour's wages that is of the type that can only be spent on for example food, would be set by observing the amount of production and employment generated by the food sector (not dependent on imports) that hobney could be used to purchase from. Same for the percentage of the total hobney paid to a worker that could be spent on housing, clothing, transportation, medical care, education, and recreation. Another determinant of these percentages would be analysis re what is good for a person, what percentage of total spending going to say housing is optimal for a person's well-being, and what percentage of total economic resources persons desire to devote to various types of expenditures.
The hobney would have to be spent purchasing from the various sectors eligible to sell to those using hobney to purchase, within a given amount of time. For example, if Leroy received a certain amount of food credits, after a certain amount of time, if Leroy did not spend those food credits, the value of the food credits would begin to decline. This would establish an incentive leading to a high velocity of circulation of the hobney. A faster circulation of the hobney from sector to sector would result in higher income, sales, production, and consumption in a given amount of time.
At this point I tend to favor the establishment of several local clusters across the nation; a worker getting paid hobney by a sector in one of the se clusters, would have to spend the hobney buying from sectors in his own local cluster. Seems to me that this would work better than say one big cluster for the entire nation which would allow a worker paid hobney in Boston to buy from a food sector eligible to sell food in exchange for hobney in California.
As of now I tend to favor say one hundred hobney clusters across the nation as opposed to one big national hobney circuit because: this being a relatively new untried approach, with many local clusters, good methods learned in the best clusters could be transferred to the less competent clusters; incompetence in a given cluster would not infect the other clusters; corruption would be easier to contain given the use of lots of local clusters; local clusters would promote more innovation and creativity, more producing- gardens-out-of-desert type activity than one big national cluster; lots of local clusters would increase the amount of innovation and education produced by the hobney system; a system featuring lots of local clusters would be much more resilient in the face of productivity impairing disasters than other clusters; the velocity of the hobney as it moved from sector to sector (clothing to transportation for example) would be greater with local clusters as opposed to one big national cluster.
If the hobney dream came true, I would appoint a panel of experts to advise me, especially with regards to facets of the hobney implementation problem that I am not sure about yet. For example, a worker might get paid one unit of housing hobney per hour, and he might want to use this housing hobney to purchase a tent that costs 100 housing hobney units. Various alternatives develop: the worker might not be able to take possession of the tent until he had paid the 100 housing hobney units in full; or, the worker might be able to take possession of the tent after paying 10 housing hobney units, the way people buy a car on credit, the other 90 housing hobney units being paid off while he had possession of the tent; or the choice in the matter could be left up to the individuals involved. Then there is the question of to what extent it should be possible to bank and to loan hobney units. Which of such various alternatives is the best, depends on pros and cons of the various alternatives, pros and cons that have to balanced against each other; it is too much to expect that I by myself should make all these balancing judgements; I by myself would not be as competent making such judgements, compared to I combined with a panel of experts.
The nation now is faced with restrictive free trade agreements. A hobney economy running parallel to the traditional international money economy, might possibly minimize offense against such trade agreements and against the aspirations of foreign nations.
Judging from what I know of the American character, the faults and strong points of American people, Americans would fit in well with a hobney type of system. Americans can be surprisingly good at mechanical skills. Producing things, inventing things, repairing things--these are activities that Americans are good at and that Americans enjoy.
The era we live in now is characterized by the presence of the internet, which was not used by most people just ten years ago but now is used by most people. I believe that the presence of the internet, which allows for free, complex, sophisticated communication between persons, means that a hobney type system would succeed much better than it would have in the pre-internet days.
This is all based upon the philosophy of economics that most attracts me at the present time, a philosophy which I consider to by my own original economic philosophy (I realize others who have not communicated with me may have come up with similar ideas independently) which is: economic growth is produced be balanced increases in the internal velocity of money combined with judicious increases in the money supply (balanced here means, for example, not too much or too little being spent by consumers on any one sector, sectors being food, housing, clothing, transportation, medical care, education, recreation, and perhaps other sectors not mentioned here).
A problem faced by any scheme designed to improve the lives of persons materially and spiritually, is that there exist individuals who are devoted to damaging the material and spiritual lives of persons. How to deal with such malicious individuals is important, but beyond the scope of the subject matter dealt with here. For now all I can say is that perhaps the malicious types would be less malicious if they considered how they themselves and their own families, would be better off if the people around them were well fed, well housed, well clothed, well educated, etc etc.
@2008 David Virgil Hobbs
Labels: community local currency currencies depression recession economy
posted by David Virgil at 4:33 AM
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