|
YES! Magazine Summer 1997 Issue: Money: Print
your Own!
Beyond Greed and Scarcity
by
Bernard Lietaer
Few people have worked in and on the money system
in as many different capacities as Bernard Lietaer. He spent five years at the
Central Bank in Belgium, where his first project was the design and
implementation of the single European currency system. He was president of
Belgium's Electronic Payment System, and has developed technologies for
multinational corporations to use in managing multiple currency
environments.
He has helped developing countries improve
their hard currency earnings and taught international finance at the University
of Louvain, in his native Belgium.
Bernard Lietaer was also the general manager and
currency trader for one of the largest and most successful offshore currency
funds.
He is currently a fellow at the Center for
Sustainable Resources at the University of California at Berkeley.
YES!editor Sarah van Gelder talked to Bernard about
the possibilities for a new kind of currency better suited to building community
and sustainability. He can be reached to discuss this topic via an Internet
conference at: http://www.transaction.net/money/
SARAH : Why do you put so much hope into the
development of alternative currencies?
BERNARD : Money is like an iron ring we've put
through our noses. We've forgotten that we designed it, and it's now leading us
around. I think it's time to figure out where we want to go - in my opinion
toward sustainability and community - and then design a money system that gets
us there.
SARAH : So you would say that the design of money
is actually at the root of much else that happens, or doesn't happen, in
society?
BERNARD : That's right. While economic textbooks
claim that people and corporations are competing for markets and resources, I
claim that in reality they are competing for money - using markets and resources
to do so. So designing new money systems really amounts to redesigning the
target that orients much human effort.
Furthermore, I believe that greed and competition
are not a result of immutable human temperament; I have come to the conclusion
that greed and fear of scarcity are in fact being continuously created and
amplified as a direct result of the kind of money we are using.
For example,
we can produce more than enough food to feed everybody, and there is definitely
enough work for everybody in the world, but there is clearly not enough money to
pay for it all. The scarcity is in our national currencies. In fact, the job of
central banks is to create and maintain that currency scarcity. The direct
consequence is that we have to fight with each other in order to
survive.
Money is created when banks lend it
into existence (see article by Thomas Greco on page 19). When a bank provides
you with a $100,000 mortgage, it creates only the principal, which you spend and
which then circulates in the economy. The bank expects you to pay back $200,000
over the next 20 years, but it doesn't create the second $100,000 - the
interest. Instead, the bank sends you out into the tough world to battle against
everybody else to bring back the second $100,000.
SARAH : So some people have to lose
in order for others to win? Some have to default on their loan in order for
others to get the money needed to pay off that interest?
BERNARD : That's right. All the banks
are doing the same thing when they lend money into existence. That is why the
decisions made by central banks, like the Federal Reserve in the US, are so
important - increased interest costs automatically determine a larger proportion
of necessary bankruptcies.
So when the bank verifies your
"creditworthiness," it is really checking whether you are capable of competing
and winning against other players - able to extract the second $100,000 that was
never created. And if you fail in that game, you lose your house or whatever
other collateral you had to put up.
SARAH : That also influences the unemployment
rate.
BERNARD : It's certainly a major factor, but
there's more to it. Information technologies increasingly allow us to attain
very good economic growth without increases in employment. I believe we're
seeing one of the last job-driven affluent periods in the US right now. As
Jeremy Rifkin argues in his book, The End of Work, jobs are basically not going
to be there anymore, even in "good times."
A study done by The International Metalworkers
Federation in Geneva predicts that within the next 30 years, 2 or 3 percent of
the world's population will be able to produce everything we need on the planet.
Even if they're off by a factor of 10, we'd still have a question of what 80
percent of humanity will do.
My forecast is that local currencies will be a
major tool for social design in the 21st century, if for no other reasons than
employment. I don't claim that these local currencies will or should replace
national currencies; that is why I call them "complementary" currencies. The
national, competition-generating currencies will still have a role in the
competitive global market. I believe, however, that complementary local
currencies are a lot better suited to developing cooperative, local
economies.
.....
..
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, April 22, 2005 4:50 PM
Subject: RE: [socialcredit] Replying to Vic (Deus
Ex Machina) -- responding to Trevor
> Hi Trevor, Congratulations on responding to Deus with such a concise
and
> accurate description of the 3 century development of what has become
the
> world's biggest, semi legal scam. Like yourself, I cannot
understand how
> any fellow human being who graduated from primary school
with ticks for the
> three "R's", and who has access to the Internet and
presumably a local
> library, can really believe that the claimed,repeated
lending of a deposit
> over and over again, to different borrowers at the
same time; is not a
> charade for the dumb proletariat, to protect
politicians in bed with the
> banks and TNC's from a public explosion of
indignation.....Reminds one of
> Lincoln's very relevant quote that if the
public really found out what the
> banks were doing to the country,
there's be a revolution before breakfast.
> (In colonial jargon 3 R's =
Reading, Riting & Rithmatic.)
>
> While out of good taste, I
have not mentioned the alternative option that
> Deus's claimed
refusal to accept that banks actually do create a money
> substitute
called credit (really interest bearing debt) out of nothing and
> then
hire it out to the country at all levels from the state downwards, may
>
not be so much an inability to understand, as a desire to
metaphorically
> muddy the water to suit a quite different objective, but
most readers will
> on their own initiative take a cool, steady look in
that direction.
>
> Sorry for having been provoked into being so
blunt.
>
>
Don Bethune of Godzone
>
###############################################
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Trevor Crosbie
[mailto:tamac@xtra.co.nz]
> Sent: Friday, 22 April 2005 20:36
> To:
socialcredit@elistas.com
>
Subject: Re: [socialcredit] Replying to Vic (Deus Ex Machina) --
>
responding to Trevor
>
>
> I am truly amazed at your lack of
understanding of the basic concept of debt
> creation - without
extensively revisiting the history of where money comes
> from and where
it goes the basic fact is this:
> Over three hundred years ago the concept
used by the goldsmiths to 'create'
> receipts on the gold they held on
behalf of their clients was extended or
> transferred or adopted for use
as the foundation for what we now call 'the
> money supply'
> It
comprised the notes and coins 'manufactured' by the treasury and the
>
'credit' issued by way of loans through the banking system. The
mechanism
> used to create the credit which the banks lent out to approved
clients was
> controlled and operated by private interests as a profit
making enterprise.
> Today that profit making enterprise has spread its
influence around the
> world and dominates and restricts the ability of
representative governments
> to fullfill the needs and expectations of
those who vote them in to that
> role. Douglas correctly identified the
money power as the root cause of the
> issues he raised in most of the
books and pamphlets he wrote. He
> unfortunately in later years linked the
problems of money (debt) to some
> form of Jewish conspiracy when in
actual fact the involvement of prominent
> Jewish families in banging and
finance stemmed from the fickle finger of
> opportunistic fate in similar
vein to the adoption of the a debt based
> mechanism as the foundation of
economic activity, originally in England and
> now around the
globe.
> Until the debt based foundation of national economies is changed
there can
> be nothing as certain as the prediction that the same issues
that have made
> media headlines for the past 50 years will continue to
make them for the
> next 5 decades. Debating the effects of the problem
without recognizing and
> rectifying (reforming) the cause is the history
of politics for centuries -
> its time for a real change.
>
Regards
> Trevor Crosbie
> Hamilton NZ
> p.s. From
Jessop - Another thing, the way you put it in your e-mail,
> Trevor, makes
it sound as if the bank claims for itself the whole debt, ie.,
> that if
the bank advances you credit of, say, $100,000, when you repay it
> the
bank is $100,000 richer than it was before the transaction. How do you
>
arrive at that conclusion?
> TC Replies - The example I use is a bank
created debt of 100k - over the
> life of the loan the capital is repayed
plus the interest. That interest can
> be as much as 4 times the original
debt. The interest acrues to the owners
> of the mechanism which created
the debt. If it is a government who borrows
> that 'money' from the bank
who operates the debt creation mechanism in order
> to build a road or a
hospital or a school or a railway or anything that can
> be seen as
something individuals in society as individuals cannot build for
>
themselves, then the people, through the taxes and charges imposed by
>
'their' government will pay once twice or three times over for 'their'
>
infrastructure rather than just once. What is more inflationary Jessop,
>
paying 100k for a sewerage scheme or paying 2,3or 400k for it?
>
TC
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Jessop Sutton"
<sutton@kingsley.co.za>
> To:
<socialcredit@elistas.com>
>
Sent: Thursday, April 21, 2005 4:55 AM
> Subject: Re: [socialcredit]
Replying to Vic (Deus Ex Machina) -- responding
> to Trevor
>
>
> > Responding to Trevor.
> >
> > Trevor,
you wrote:-
> > "The only way forward is to back interest bearing debt
out of the system
> > by
> > using the power of credit,
controlled by the people, to provide essential
> > infratstructure,
free of debt, for future generations as a starting point
> > for the
introduction of a Social Credit economy."
> >
> > I see Bill
Ryan has replied to this.
> > =============================
>
>
> > Trevor, you also says:-
> > "That process is driven
by the need to service an ever growing level of
> > international,
national, regional, company and personal debt - all owed to
> > the
owner operators of the debt mechanism."
> >
> > This often
puzzles me. Why is interest charged by a banker for his
> >
services
> > seen as anything different than the 'imple markup applied
by any industry
> > to
> > provide a dividend to it's
shareholders? Are the holders of shares in
> > banks
> > less
entitled to a return of their investment than are the shareholders on
>
> one of the multi-national oil corporations? Or even, say, of the movie
and
> > entertainment industries which provide a service to those who
want to make
> > use of it, and a good return for those invested in the
industry?
> >
> > Here's a quote very much to the point from a
recent e-mail by our Margeret
> > Legum, a lobbyist for a better deal
for the poor:-
> > "If neither the world's consumers nor its farmers
are doing well out of
> > agriculture, who is benefiting? It is our old
friends the multinational
> > corporations and supermarkets. Mergers,
acquisitions and interlinking have
> > reduced their number to about
five groups that control most of the world's
> > staple food economy
from supplying seed to buying produce, to processing
> > and
>
> selling. Since they are virtual monopolies they have a strong
influence
> > over
> > prices. They are exceptionally
profitable." [SANE Views Vol.5, No.8, 19
> > April
> >
2005.]
> >
> > Are these multinationals more entitled to
reward their investers than are
> > the
> > banks? Bill Ryan
not so long ago made the point excellently on this list
> >
that
> > interest is merely the banks charge for its services.
>
> =============
> >
> > Another thing, the way you put it
in your e-mail, Trevor, makes it sound
> > as
> > if the bank
claims for itself the whole debt, ie., that if the bank
> >
advances
> > you credit of, say, $100,000, when you repay it the bank
is $100,000
> > richer
> > than it was before the transaction.
How do you arrive at that conclusion?
> >
> > Jessop.
>
>
>
---------------------------------------------------------------------
>
You're subscribed to this list with the email donzbeth@ihug.co.nz
> To
unsubscribe, send a message to
> socialcredit-unsubscribe@elistas.com
> For more information, visit http://www.eListas.com/list/socialcredit
> |
Re: [socialcredit]
Reply to this message
