eCANomy

taking the con out of the system

Introducing a practical way to build an alternative economy that takes the con out of the system. That’s right, no debt, no interest, no profit, no money at all. It combines individual voluntary action with cooperative enterprise to deliver goods and services without any need for government, currency or financiers. It can be started locally immediately with even just a small group of people who are tired of the financial slavery in our current system.

Here’s how it works. You help your neighbour by cutting his lawn. He shows his gratitude by posting a thanks online. A special database will be established here to record all thanks coming in. Your account will now show 1 thanks. You provide your labour for free. No money changes hands unless priced materials and supplies are needed for the job. You might charge a small amount to cover the cost of the gasoline so that you can replenish your supplies for the next job, but no other money is requested.

As you continue helping people however you are able, their thanks accumulates in your online gratitude account. Once you have acquired enough thanks your reputation is established at the first level (how much thanks is required and how many levels there are can be decided by members of the club).

If you want to do something more complicated that requires several people to achieve, you would channel your individual talent and energy into a voluntary cooperative that operates in exactly the same way as individuals contribute labour independently. People receiving goods and services from the cooperative would only pay for the materials and supplies used by the cooperative that were priced in the currency of the old economy. Here the collective labour would be free and the thanks received by the cooperative would raise the online gratitude and reputation levels of each member of the coop (whether they worked on that particular project or not).

Producers would sell a portion of their goods and services to the old economy to acquire the dollars needed to purchase supplies for the next production cycle. Another part would be reserved to give their own workers a right of first access to the production. The remaining portion would be available to all of the other club members for free, or for only the dollar cost of the external inputs if sales of the first portion were lacking. Producers would decide themselves how big each portion needs to be. They would also set a maximum quantity of their goods and services that any individual, including their own workers, can request. This would protect against hoarding and selfishness.

Now here’s the really interesting part. The reputation level of an individual determines what goods and services he or she can receive for free from the community. The supply and material costs incurred by the producer will still have to be paid using the currency of the old economy but as more people and coops come onboard as suppliers, the need for of those old economy inputs will decrease and eventually disappear. Now pay attention, here is the most important point. Club members do not spend their thanks when they receive gifts from other members. Their gratitude level remains the same. The only way they pay for the goods and services they receive (apart from the supply and material costs) is by giving thanks online to the person or coop that supplied them.

This is a perpetually renewing system that grows on gratitude, not greed. Receiving thanks raises an individual’s online reputation level. Each higher level offers a broader range of free goods and services to enjoy. At the start, the lowest level might include only relatively simple things like lawn cutting, dog walking or hair cutting (no offence intended by using these as examples). Higher gratitude levels would include more complicated items or products that take longer to develop or grow like food, repairs, or construction. Obviously, there would be a huge demand for raw materials, machinery and supplies that could replace the need for outside costs and currency. The gratitude levels of coops providing such resources would accelerate quickly.

To ensure that users stay active and contribute their labour continuously individual gratitude levels should be depreciated occasionally. Once this idea gets going club members can decide what the depreciation rate and frequency should be. For example a 10% monthly depreciation rate would pretty much exclude anyone who hadn’t contributed labour during the last year from enjoying the club benefits.

The capital to start or expand cooperative actions could come from crowdfunding or the reallocated savings of people who are looking for ways to avoid the Great Taking (see my article here). Starting this concept locally will help citizens buffer themselves against the isolation and scarcity of resources caused by economic disruptions and supply chain failures in the traditional economy. With this concept, we don’t need government or money to look after ourselves. Instead we have to take responsibility and action ourselves and together. Think of each community as being a single cell that will expand into a broader network of trade that will eventually extend provincially, nationally and internationally, a network without non-productive middlemen and government usurers that steal the wealth that real workers create.

Come on folks, we can do this. Start talking about it with friends and family in your own community. Arrange a local face-to-face meeting to discuss the possibilities. Even if only 2 or 3 people attend the first meeting, together you can organize and plan how to grow from there. People know the economy is tanking and that governments are crooks, but they don’t know what to do about it. Show them this idea. Please re-stack this post here on Substack and hit the share button to send it to Facebook and Telegram. Together we CAN change the world. Please comment below.