Dangers of alternative currencies

[Guest guest]

On 05 Jan 1999, Madhava Gosh wrote:

> Alternative currencies do have another require - that those participating

are

> producing goods and services that can be used by other participants.

 

There is yet another requirement: that these goods and services

must be properly valued. In particular, value-adding enterprises

should be able to be recognized as value-adders, while

value-subtracting enterprises don't have the opportunity to pass as

such. Otherwise, there is every danger of turning into a "virtual

economy" like the one currently operating in Russia. In this scheme,

value-subtracting companies use barter to make themselves look

productive when they are actually incredible wastes of money and

goods. There's an interesting article about this at

http://www.foreignaffairs.org/issues/9809/gaddy.html .

 

-- Vijay

[Guest guest]

On 05 Jan 1999, Madhava Gosh wrote:

> Alternative currencies do have another require - that those participating

are

> producing goods and services that can be used by other participants.

 

There is yet another requirement: that these goods and services

must be properly valued. In particular, value-adding enterprises

should be able to be recognized as value-adders, while

value-subtracting enterprises don't have the opportunity to pass as

such. Otherwise, there is every danger of turning into a "virtual

economy" like the one currently operating in Russia. In this scheme,

value-subtracting companies use barter to make themselves look

productive when they are actually incredible wastes of money and

goods. There's an interesting article about this at

http://www.foreignaffairs.org/issues/9809/gaddy.html .

 

-- Vijay