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peter lindsay

Physics Teacher,

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Is there an alternative to money?

I read many entries on this site that tell me about the evils of money and how rampant capitalism is destroying the world. SO! I'm a highschool science teacher. I teach on average100 students per day for 1 or 2 hours each. How can I be compensated for my service in a way that doesn't involve some sort of promissory note?

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    Fritzie Reisner 100+

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    Feb 28 2013: A couple of months ago I attended a lecture by representatives of a non-profit working to promote education in Myanmar. Because there isn't a banking system there and it is difficult to distribute money in that country, the program had no useful way of drawing teachers to remote villages by paying them.

    So the non-profit arranged for the teachers to be compensated with extra food, housing, and a computer.

    I am not saying that it is efficient to compensate you in this way, Peter, but there are work arrangements that don't involve exchanges of money.

    As a second example, I saw a video Monday about health care in a poor province in India. Poor people there typically prefer to take their health issues to a practitioner called a bhopa, who does incantations of various kinds. While they do provide some monetary payment for the service, part of what the patient is required to do is bring the bhopa a chicken or goat, which is the major part of the payment.
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      peter lindsay 30+

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      Feb 28 2013: I can see how it could work on a small scale Fritzie but I can't really see it going past there. The school at which I work has 1300 students and 120 staff. The staff all have different wants and needs and the parents of the students all have different talents to offer as payment. It just seems that even in a barter based society everyone ends up writing IOUs or making Barterbucks because it just simplifies the whole thing.
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        Fritzie Reisner 100+

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        Feb 28 2013: You are right that there needs to be some sort of barterbucks or a giant administrative arrangement.
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        Gail . 50+

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        Feb 28 2013: Barter is nothing more than a different form of money. Those of us who speak of a money-ess society equate barter with dollars, because dollars are just a substitute for the items you want to trade. (a dollar is easier to carry around than 12 chickens).

        Money creates social inequality while destroying the social cohesion.

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