Let's start an alternative "barter" economy

Ok, so lots of people are suffering. Lots of people are fed up. Lots of people realize that the economy is quite possibly going down....

So, my question is: why haven't we started an "alternative" bartering economy yet? Screw the banks.....let's start our own non-currency economic system.

We did something like that once in 6th grade as a class project. We bartered for a week. It was very, very cool...learned a lot about human psychology, money, services, time, etc... I'm 40 years old, and I still remember it today.


[edit on 4-9-2009 by nikiano]

We already have one in our little town. Nothing has a fixed value, it's value depends on if the other needs it and what you want in return.

I have traded jam, use of my skid steer and other things for food, car repairs, drywall mudding etc.

Or you could have a more formal system where you have a standard as your base line and everyone gives that as the units. I personally like the idea of using a pound of wheat or a pound of rye as a base line. This would allow you to litterally grow your own money. Then if you wanted say a tank of gas, you goto the local station they weight the bucket of grain and give you the same value in gas. That means in years of low grain production the value of all goods would go up because of the shortage.

i completely agree with you here. damn the banks, damn money... humanity needs to think of a better way to distribute "wealth" and goods and this is exactly what i think we should do. i have no idea how it could work unless we became an isolated nation or the rest of the world changed with us but i hate money, i hate banks i believe a return to bartering would be healthy and good for americans and humanity.

its already exist, by the way friend of mine owns it,
check bartercard.com

reply to post by nikiano


It's a nice Utopian ideal, but people want a measure of what they give, and what they get, and that leads to money.