Tomorrow I find myself speaking at not one but two meetings about our timebank. How to start one seems to be the in-thing. Now why would an inner city suburb of our capital city have a talk on a local currency like a timebank? It probably isn't because they are broke (local currencies thrive in hard economic times) because the average salary in Wellington is the highest in NZ. It is possibly to build community cohesion to insure them against crises like earthquakes.
The other talk (Ben is doing the main talk and I am just there to back up, knowing the history of our Otaki Timebank) is at Paraparaumu. A keen young woman started a Facebook group and it is through that group the event has been advertised. The Kapiti Coast is like the suburbia Kunstler talks about as being the most expensive experiment ever done by western nations. It is spread out.
Lyttelton has been a huge success as a timebank having been going over five years now. Margaret Jefferies is an inspiring speaker and has done a stalwart job over that time. Lyttelton is geographically clearly defined and the houses are all within a smallish area, whereas Paraparaumu, Raumati, Waikanae, Paekakariki is spread out over a narrow strip of coastal land. Quite a different profile.
I have also had a call from someone in Johnsonville and a woman in Tauranga about how to start a timebank. Must get in touch with Margaret, because it is they that have the funding to support new timebanks now. They are nearly recovered from the resignation of their coordinator and in a month will be up and running well.
Friday, May 27, 2011
Monday, May 23, 2011
Restarting after a trip to KCDC
Just been to Kapiti Coast District Council where I accompanied my husband Malcolm Murchie. He was giving a submission on behalf of the Democrats for Social Credit and it was quite good.
He spoke of the growing debt of KCDC, now at $99 million. It grows each year because they only pay off $5m a year though they pay $6.7 in interest to overseas owned banks. The request was that KCDC takes a remit to the Local Bodies conference asking for Reserve Bank credit at zero or very low interest rates. Total debt of all local bodies in NZ is $6.5 billion. A reasonable request and now he needs to find a councillor to champion this and at least have their discussion held in public. Otherwise they will discuss it and dismiss it quickly while in committee.
We had sat through very worthy submissions from small local groups like the Te Horo ratepayers asking for a few thousand dollars, and the Lions club and the Surf Club. The amounts are tiny in comparison with $6.7 million of potential savings, money wasted in interest.
I have been contemplating what is going to happen economically as things come to a head on the international financial scene. The European Union is in trouble with Greek, Portugal, Italy and Spain being in such severe debt and Strauss Kahn who would have rescued them is in jail. Last night the European sharemarket dropped. Collapse is bound to occur one day soon. The Irish originated book Fleeing Vesuvius is being published by Living Economies soon, explaining what could happen as demand for oil finally outstrips the supply and how an economy can no longer grow after peak oil. The economic system is set up to demand economic growth and with resources finally meeting geographical limits it is all going to stop. In fact Richard Heinberg says the global economy stopped growing around Sept 08 when there was a collapse in oil prices.
What with the price of food continuing to rise, and the price of house insurance about to rise by 50% because the reinsurance companies can't deal with two Christchurch earthquakes, a Queensland flood and a Japanese tsunami, we are all going to be in dire economic straits soon. If the TPP free trade agreement goes ahead then the price of medicines may also rise. Rob Hopkins, founder of the Transition Network, said on his blog the other day that we need to move now from peak oil and climate change to the strengthening the local economy.
Of course I am in favour of local currencies. In their economic crisis in 2002 Argentina didn't only have a plethora of local currencies, but their government legislated to allow regional governments to issue their own currency. Local currencies can never scale up to the needed $6.7 million required in the Kapiti District Council area. So it is either going to be a regional currency or we will have to get Reserve Bank money as US did in the big financial crisis, though it was called "quantitative easing" to give it an aura of mysticism and noone could understand what it was.
I guess as things get worse, we are going to stagger towards all these solutions, but all too late to prevent terrible suffering.
He spoke of the growing debt of KCDC, now at $99 million. It grows each year because they only pay off $5m a year though they pay $6.7 in interest to overseas owned banks. The request was that KCDC takes a remit to the Local Bodies conference asking for Reserve Bank credit at zero or very low interest rates. Total debt of all local bodies in NZ is $6.5 billion. A reasonable request and now he needs to find a councillor to champion this and at least have their discussion held in public. Otherwise they will discuss it and dismiss it quickly while in committee.
We had sat through very worthy submissions from small local groups like the Te Horo ratepayers asking for a few thousand dollars, and the Lions club and the Surf Club. The amounts are tiny in comparison with $6.7 million of potential savings, money wasted in interest.
I have been contemplating what is going to happen economically as things come to a head on the international financial scene. The European Union is in trouble with Greek, Portugal, Italy and Spain being in such severe debt and Strauss Kahn who would have rescued them is in jail. Last night the European sharemarket dropped. Collapse is bound to occur one day soon. The Irish originated book Fleeing Vesuvius is being published by Living Economies soon, explaining what could happen as demand for oil finally outstrips the supply and how an economy can no longer grow after peak oil. The economic system is set up to demand economic growth and with resources finally meeting geographical limits it is all going to stop. In fact Richard Heinberg says the global economy stopped growing around Sept 08 when there was a collapse in oil prices.
What with the price of food continuing to rise, and the price of house insurance about to rise by 50% because the reinsurance companies can't deal with two Christchurch earthquakes, a Queensland flood and a Japanese tsunami, we are all going to be in dire economic straits soon. If the TPP free trade agreement goes ahead then the price of medicines may also rise. Rob Hopkins, founder of the Transition Network, said on his blog the other day that we need to move now from peak oil and climate change to the strengthening the local economy.
Of course I am in favour of local currencies. In their economic crisis in 2002 Argentina didn't only have a plethora of local currencies, but their government legislated to allow regional governments to issue their own currency. Local currencies can never scale up to the needed $6.7 million required in the Kapiti District Council area. So it is either going to be a regional currency or we will have to get Reserve Bank money as US did in the big financial crisis, though it was called "quantitative easing" to give it an aura of mysticism and noone could understand what it was.
I guess as things get worse, we are going to stagger towards all these solutions, but all too late to prevent terrible suffering.
Saturday, February 28, 2009
A review of my book by Rimu Atkinson on Transition Towns website
I was pleased to notice this review on the website http://www.transitiontowns.org.nz
The first 1/4 of this book spends some time explaining how our current money system works and spelling out some of the implications: eternal debt, pressure to exploit more and more natural resources and concentration of wealth and power.
The other 3/4 of the book talks about solutions; complementary economic and monetary systems which have been tried all over the world and documents their successes and failures. There is a strong relevance to us in New Zealand, as it has many current examples of things that happened or are happening here. A vision of overlapping local, regional, national and international currencies that function in an ecological fashion is presented, which although appealing is probably too breathtaking in scope for most people to stomach. Maybe it'll come to pass, but certainly not all at once!
After finishing this book you will have a firm grounding in the basics of a wide variety of different approaches to money and an awareness of how to avoid some obvious (in hindsight!) mistakes that others have made in the past.
I highly recommend this book for anyone who is interested in LETS or complimentary currencies or who is in need of inspiration on how to respond to the ongoing financial collapse.
The first 1/4 of this book spends some time explaining how our current money system works and spelling out some of the implications: eternal debt, pressure to exploit more and more natural resources and concentration of wealth and power.
The other 3/4 of the book talks about solutions; complementary economic and monetary systems which have been tried all over the world and documents their successes and failures. There is a strong relevance to us in New Zealand, as it has many current examples of things that happened or are happening here. A vision of overlapping local, regional, national and international currencies that function in an ecological fashion is presented, which although appealing is probably too breathtaking in scope for most people to stomach. Maybe it'll come to pass, but certainly not all at once!
After finishing this book you will have a firm grounding in the basics of a wide variety of different approaches to money and an awareness of how to avoid some obvious (in hindsight!) mistakes that others have made in the past.
I highly recommend this book for anyone who is interested in LETS or complimentary currencies or who is in need of inspiration on how to respond to the ongoing financial collapse.
Monday, October 20, 2008
Ideas evolving from my tour of Nortland
My tour of Northland has brought new learnings on mutual credit systems
Thanks to Geoff and Naomi Waterhouse, Ken Ross and the Far North District Council I was able to respond to their requests to speak to several Transition Towns groups on the issue of money. There were 70 at Kerikeri, 25 at Kaitaia, 75 at Whangarei and 20 at Kaiwaka. The format was to show the film Money as Debt followed by a short discussion, a break, a short powerpoint where I outlined the designs of various community currency systems, and then discussion. A big challenge!
I remain more convinced than ever that the 47 minute Canadian documentary on money showing what a pernicious and unsustainable system we have inherited over the centuries, that this film teaches it brilliantly, with animation and clarity.
Now the case of Kaiwaka has set me thinking. Gail Aitken who had been a member of a LETS system in UK, had set up a small LETS after coming to Kaiwaka to an intentional community at Koanga Gardens. If measured by the trading volume per member, it is a very successful scheme. It has only 40 members but they all know each other extremely well. There is another intentional community involved and a few from the small township of Kaiwaka, an hour south of Whangarei.
The purpose of the discussion was to work out ways to improve their scheme. Gail runs it using just a spreadsheet. She is paid by the system in the local currency, the kauri. They don’t use the internet and the members showed no desire to be dependent on the internet as they believed the LETs was more resilient that way.
In the discussion it became clear that three members were greatly in credit ($4000 and more) and one of these said very eloquently that she didn’t particularly want to spend it as they had all they needed and were against consuming for its own sake. The same woman, when someone pointed out that a solo mother of three children had not traded and was in debit to the system, declared with feeling that the woman was already working raising the children and there should be no pressure on her to trade. (Others may have implied she should sell something or work for others in the mutual circle.)
Afterwards I was pondering. I was thinking about the Time Banking model in Lyttelton which has a Community Chest as a member. An interior design company had done some work free for the system and been credited with Hours. The company donated their hours to the Community Chest so that those who had no time or health to work for others could be supported.
I spoke to one of the administrators of the Kaiwaka system afterwards suggested that if their system tended to be blocked by people with large credits they didn’t particularly want to spend, then they could look to the time bank model and set up a community chest. In that way the solo mother could be cared for while she was doing her child care. “In a way you are setting up a mini social welfare system within your circle”. He was fascinated by the idea.
My other observation was that Kaiwaka may be a model for others wanting to set up mutual credit trading circles without the Internet. Each of the types of currencies could forge links with the others, with exchange rates being determined regularly, thus extending the variety of goods and services available, and giving members a better experience still.
Perhaps there could be a network of LETS systems on the web and a network not on the web. After all when you think of what is happening in the soil in the root system of any plant, there are millions of small fungi, bacteria and working. There is an ecosystem of millions of tiny micro-oganisms where nutrients and energy are exchanged to everyone’s benefits. Feedback loops tell where the needs are and the surplus resources.
We have often talked about how important it is to develop trust and bonding in a community before a community currency can be successful. Well, why not skip this step and go to communities which already have done their bonding and teach them to set up a mutual credit circle for trading? As the global economy collapses around us, local bowling clubs, schools, maraes, Rotary clubs, sports clubs and RSA’s will be amenable. Why not have a series of small interlinking LETs systems in a small town or suburb, rather than one big one? That will give us more administrators, more resilience, more innovation and bigger numbers, vastly improving the experience of community currencies. If they include in each scheme a Community Chest it would be a lifeboat in the case of a ravaged centralised benefit system. This would prepare for the huge scale movement of the newly unemployed city members returning home, complete with their alcohol, debt, drug and gang problems.
Mutual banking
As the international banking system goes through its reform spasms it is critical to develop mini local models under the radar as well. To start a new bank now costs a prohibitive $30m, up from $15million recently.
I am in mind of a Samoan woman who told me during Mike Rowbotham’s visit early this decade that they had systems where members paid a certain amount per month into a pool and at the end of the month there was a draw for an interest free loan. If someone didn’t want it they drew again. As the reformers of the national currencies of the world and the banking system of the world get into action over the next few years, so will those who are building a new money system at the flaxroots level. I have often thought we need a conference to work on a new financial system –Permaculture Economics? Soilweb Financial Systems? A conference gives face to face contact and may attract those working at higher levels as well.
Thanks to Geoff and Naomi Waterhouse, Ken Ross and the Far North District Council I was able to respond to their requests to speak to several Transition Towns groups on the issue of money. There were 70 at Kerikeri, 25 at Kaitaia, 75 at Whangarei and 20 at Kaiwaka. The format was to show the film Money as Debt followed by a short discussion, a break, a short powerpoint where I outlined the designs of various community currency systems, and then discussion. A big challenge!
I remain more convinced than ever that the 47 minute Canadian documentary on money showing what a pernicious and unsustainable system we have inherited over the centuries, that this film teaches it brilliantly, with animation and clarity.
Now the case of Kaiwaka has set me thinking. Gail Aitken who had been a member of a LETS system in UK, had set up a small LETS after coming to Kaiwaka to an intentional community at Koanga Gardens. If measured by the trading volume per member, it is a very successful scheme. It has only 40 members but they all know each other extremely well. There is another intentional community involved and a few from the small township of Kaiwaka, an hour south of Whangarei.
The purpose of the discussion was to work out ways to improve their scheme. Gail runs it using just a spreadsheet. She is paid by the system in the local currency, the kauri. They don’t use the internet and the members showed no desire to be dependent on the internet as they believed the LETs was more resilient that way.
In the discussion it became clear that three members were greatly in credit ($4000 and more) and one of these said very eloquently that she didn’t particularly want to spend it as they had all they needed and were against consuming for its own sake. The same woman, when someone pointed out that a solo mother of three children had not traded and was in debit to the system, declared with feeling that the woman was already working raising the children and there should be no pressure on her to trade. (Others may have implied she should sell something or work for others in the mutual circle.)
Afterwards I was pondering. I was thinking about the Time Banking model in Lyttelton which has a Community Chest as a member. An interior design company had done some work free for the system and been credited with Hours. The company donated their hours to the Community Chest so that those who had no time or health to work for others could be supported.
I spoke to one of the administrators of the Kaiwaka system afterwards suggested that if their system tended to be blocked by people with large credits they didn’t particularly want to spend, then they could look to the time bank model and set up a community chest. In that way the solo mother could be cared for while she was doing her child care. “In a way you are setting up a mini social welfare system within your circle”. He was fascinated by the idea.
My other observation was that Kaiwaka may be a model for others wanting to set up mutual credit trading circles without the Internet. Each of the types of currencies could forge links with the others, with exchange rates being determined regularly, thus extending the variety of goods and services available, and giving members a better experience still.
Perhaps there could be a network of LETS systems on the web and a network not on the web. After all when you think of what is happening in the soil in the root system of any plant, there are millions of small fungi, bacteria and working. There is an ecosystem of millions of tiny micro-oganisms where nutrients and energy are exchanged to everyone’s benefits. Feedback loops tell where the needs are and the surplus resources.
We have often talked about how important it is to develop trust and bonding in a community before a community currency can be successful. Well, why not skip this step and go to communities which already have done their bonding and teach them to set up a mutual credit circle for trading? As the global economy collapses around us, local bowling clubs, schools, maraes, Rotary clubs, sports clubs and RSA’s will be amenable. Why not have a series of small interlinking LETs systems in a small town or suburb, rather than one big one? That will give us more administrators, more resilience, more innovation and bigger numbers, vastly improving the experience of community currencies. If they include in each scheme a Community Chest it would be a lifeboat in the case of a ravaged centralised benefit system. This would prepare for the huge scale movement of the newly unemployed city members returning home, complete with their alcohol, debt, drug and gang problems.
Mutual banking
As the international banking system goes through its reform spasms it is critical to develop mini local models under the radar as well. To start a new bank now costs a prohibitive $30m, up from $15million recently.
I am in mind of a Samoan woman who told me during Mike Rowbotham’s visit early this decade that they had systems where members paid a certain amount per month into a pool and at the end of the month there was a draw for an interest free loan. If someone didn’t want it they drew again. As the reformers of the national currencies of the world and the banking system of the world get into action over the next few years, so will those who are building a new money system at the flaxroots level. I have often thought we need a conference to work on a new financial system –Permaculture Economics? Soilweb Financial Systems? A conference gives face to face contact and may attract those working at higher levels as well.
News media quotes my book in Coromandel
Thomas Everth writes a regular green blog for a Coromandel paper.
He writes a monthly a column under the title "Green Blog" for his local paper the Coromandel Town Chronicle.
A copy of Novembers edition (minus the last bit on another topic) is below.
Green Blog
One of the main topics of this years Eco Show in Taupo – and timely so – was the state of our financial systems and how their current construction might be the underlying root cause of much of the world’s problems.
Few people realise – according to Deirdre Kent, one of the speakers on these issues and member of ‘Living Economies’ and author of ‘Healthy Money, Healthy Planet’ – how money is created in this country and around the western world. Most of it is not created as physical currency, the paper notes and coins you can carry in your wallet by central banks and governments, but as interest bearing dept when individuals, governments and businesses take out loans from lending institutions at the stroke of a pen as a balance on a bank account held against some collateral (a property, your future income etc.).
The problem with this is that the banks create the principal of the loans at the stroke of a pen for you to spend, but not the interest they expect you and everybody else to bring back to them. This causes the entire system to be in constant need to expand and to create more money - as further interest bearing dept - so that the interest of previous loans can be paid. This system only works if even more money is created and as long as the value and the amount of the underlying assets upon which loans are given also rises. In fact the entire financial system only works if and as long as it keeps growing. You will have heard it from most politicians: “We need the economy to grow by x% per year”.
But if you grow something every year by a percentage of what you already have then you get “Exponential Growth”. In nature there are no stable systems that allow exponential growth to go on. Simple math will tell you that a single penny invested at 5% compounding interest 2000 years ago would today be worth 134 billion balls of Gold each the weight of the Earth at the 1990 gold prices! You will probably need to read this a few times to comprehend these numbers but its true. Exponential growth always leads to a catastrophic end and the only cases of exponential growth in natural systems are quickly self-limiting. Take the exponential growth of yeast bacteria in a brewing vet as an example. The bacteria grow exponentially until the concentration of the yeast’s excrement (Alcohol) is killing them off. Another example of exponential growth of cause is Cancer.
Exponential growth is unsustainable when you live on a finite planet. And even if we had a whole bunch of planets it will not work for very long as the example above shows, where the exponential growth of a single penny devours just about every bit of matter in our Galaxy in the short order of just 2000 years. Our exponential growth dependent financial systems must therefore fall over every few generations in a wave of deep destruction before they can carry on growing again until we one day perhaps might come to our senses and develop a steady state economic system and live like all enduring natural systems in a state of balance and harmony with our environment.
Let’s for argument sake include all the people that will live in the next 7 generations when we take a democratic vote on our actions today. Why not? The fact that they are not able to speak yet should not be held against them. Why should we deprive them constantly of all their rights? Imagine what the actions of our democratic system would be then? A steady system that would give enduring sustenance to humanity and all natural systems upon which we depend? I bet!
Since we have an election upon us when you read this take a look which of the candidates and parties might have grasp of all this besides prescribing more of the same as cure…
Thomas Everth
He writes a monthly a column under the title "Green Blog" for his local paper the Coromandel Town Chronicle.
A copy of Novembers edition (minus the last bit on another topic) is below.
Green Blog
One of the main topics of this years Eco Show in Taupo – and timely so – was the state of our financial systems and how their current construction might be the underlying root cause of much of the world’s problems.
Few people realise – according to Deirdre Kent, one of the speakers on these issues and member of ‘Living Economies’ and author of ‘Healthy Money, Healthy Planet’ – how money is created in this country and around the western world. Most of it is not created as physical currency, the paper notes and coins you can carry in your wallet by central banks and governments, but as interest bearing dept when individuals, governments and businesses take out loans from lending institutions at the stroke of a pen as a balance on a bank account held against some collateral (a property, your future income etc.).
The problem with this is that the banks create the principal of the loans at the stroke of a pen for you to spend, but not the interest they expect you and everybody else to bring back to them. This causes the entire system to be in constant need to expand and to create more money - as further interest bearing dept - so that the interest of previous loans can be paid. This system only works if even more money is created and as long as the value and the amount of the underlying assets upon which loans are given also rises. In fact the entire financial system only works if and as long as it keeps growing. You will have heard it from most politicians: “We need the economy to grow by x% per year”.
But if you grow something every year by a percentage of what you already have then you get “Exponential Growth”. In nature there are no stable systems that allow exponential growth to go on. Simple math will tell you that a single penny invested at 5% compounding interest 2000 years ago would today be worth 134 billion balls of Gold each the weight of the Earth at the 1990 gold prices! You will probably need to read this a few times to comprehend these numbers but its true. Exponential growth always leads to a catastrophic end and the only cases of exponential growth in natural systems are quickly self-limiting. Take the exponential growth of yeast bacteria in a brewing vet as an example. The bacteria grow exponentially until the concentration of the yeast’s excrement (Alcohol) is killing them off. Another example of exponential growth of cause is Cancer.
Exponential growth is unsustainable when you live on a finite planet. And even if we had a whole bunch of planets it will not work for very long as the example above shows, where the exponential growth of a single penny devours just about every bit of matter in our Galaxy in the short order of just 2000 years. Our exponential growth dependent financial systems must therefore fall over every few generations in a wave of deep destruction before they can carry on growing again until we one day perhaps might come to our senses and develop a steady state economic system and live like all enduring natural systems in a state of balance and harmony with our environment.
Let’s for argument sake include all the people that will live in the next 7 generations when we take a democratic vote on our actions today. Why not? The fact that they are not able to speak yet should not be held against them. Why should we deprive them constantly of all their rights? Imagine what the actions of our democratic system would be then? A steady system that would give enduring sustenance to humanity and all natural systems upon which we depend? I bet!
Since we have an election upon us when you read this take a look which of the candidates and parties might have grasp of all this besides prescribing more of the same as cure…
Thomas Everth
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Review from Italy
I found this on the web
Just when you thought you knew about how to save civilisation through turning off lights using public transport of driving less, Deirdre Kent confronts us with an unpalatable truth. The world's money system is designed so that the money supply and hence the size of the global economy must keep on increasing exponentially or it will collapse.
"Sometimes I wish I didn't know about the money system and I could put my knowledge back in the bottle and screw the lid on" said Deirdre Kent. "It is so frustrating to watch top environmentalists describe the mess we have all got into with runaway climate change and a world blind to the bombshell of peak oil when I know that it is the money system which demands economic growth. Why else would politiicians, journalists and economist all advocate economic growth for the last four decades of environmental decay and noone connect the dots?'
Kent's book is one of many on the money system, books that are rarely read because people think they can't understand economics. However this book is clear and easy to read as many reviewers have discovered.
Kent spends a third of the book explaining how the current money system is sick and the rest describing the huge array of local currencies available currencies which are created without interest.
The reviews of her book include Management Magazine, who say "Deirdre Kent, previously the tenacious leader of the country's anti-smoking lobby, has written an impeccably researched book that deserves to be read. It discusses, in an agreeably jargon-free and readable fashion, how the current system works, or doesn't."
Just when you thought you knew about how to save civilisation through turning off lights using public transport of driving less, Deirdre Kent confronts us with an unpalatable truth. The world's money system is designed so that the money supply and hence the size of the global economy must keep on increasing exponentially or it will collapse.
"Sometimes I wish I didn't know about the money system and I could put my knowledge back in the bottle and screw the lid on" said Deirdre Kent. "It is so frustrating to watch top environmentalists describe the mess we have all got into with runaway climate change and a world blind to the bombshell of peak oil when I know that it is the money system which demands economic growth. Why else would politiicians, journalists and economist all advocate economic growth for the last four decades of environmental decay and noone connect the dots?'
Kent's book is one of many on the money system, books that are rarely read because people think they can't understand economics. However this book is clear and easy to read as many reviewers have discovered.
Kent spends a third of the book explaining how the current money system is sick and the rest describing the huge array of local currencies available currencies which are created without interest.
The reviews of her book include Management Magazine, who say "Deirdre Kent, previously the tenacious leader of the country's anti-smoking lobby, has written an impeccably researched book that deserves to be read. It discusses, in an agreeably jargon-free and readable fashion, how the current system works, or doesn't."
Thursday, April 03, 2008
Recommendation from David De Cleene of Auckland
Hi Deirdre
I’d like to congratulate you on writing one of the most amazing books I’ve ever read in terms of:
1. Pointing out something so critical to the very fabric of our society,
2. Making something so complex so simple,
3. Being so completely thorough, and,
4. Offering possible solutions
I’ve been writing a book for the last 6 years and so understand just how much effort goes into a book. A friend of mine passed your book on to me a week ago and it’s perfectly what I was looking for. Even more amazing that you’re a Kiwi...
David De Cleene
Parnell
Auckland
April 08
I’d like to congratulate you on writing one of the most amazing books I’ve ever read in terms of:
1. Pointing out something so critical to the very fabric of our society,
2. Making something so complex so simple,
3. Being so completely thorough, and,
4. Offering possible solutions
I’ve been writing a book for the last 6 years and so understand just how much effort goes into a book. A friend of mine passed your book on to me a week ago and it’s perfectly what I was looking for. Even more amazing that you’re a Kiwi...
David De Cleene
Parnell
Auckland
April 08
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
Front cover
Just thought I would put the front cover on this page too. The book is still having an effect and I get lovely emails from people who enjoyed it.
Monday, February 19, 2007
Over a thousand copies sold now
The first print was 1000 and the second was 500. It seems to have sold quite well. All sorts of people email me with congratulations. They say I have set them thinking. The latest was a former currency trader. Helen Dew and I sold nine copies between us at the recent Levin Organic River Festival and spoke with all sorts of people during the weekend. We also ran two workshops one with Helen and me and the other with Gary Williams, Singa Sheen and me regarding a proposed local voucher scheme.
Wednesday, August 02, 2006
Ian Grant reviews book for Management Magazine
Healthy Money, Healthy
Planet
By: Deirdre Kent
Publisher: Craig Potton Publishing
Price: $34.99
Sustainability is a current buzz word among politicians and business leaders. It is on many lips; but lip service is about as far as it usually goes.
There’s barely even lip service paid to the idea that our present economic system is not sustainable. It’s a bit like democracy. Most of us accept it without question; some worry about it but decide the alternatives are worse. Yet there are growing doubts about the sustainability, the very survival of the economic system that makes most of the world go round, and that we all depend on so completely.
Deirdre Kent’s Healthy Money, Healthy Planet both confronts the realities and considers some of the alternatives. She argues, as do economists like Richard Douthwaite, that the present debt-based global economic system must continue to grow or it will collapse. “The ritual worship of the desirability of economic growth” can, she writes, be traced to capitalism’s total dependence on continuous economic growth because of the need to pay interest on borrowed money. Almost all our money supply is created by interest-bearing debt by private banks; the Reserve Bank has confirmed that only 2 percent of the money in use in New Zealand is created interest-free.
Collapse is not just a theoretical possibility: witness the Argentinian and Thai economies and Japan’s struggle with its banks’ bad debts for over a decade. “At the time of writing,” noted Kent, “Japan spends more than 40 percent of its taxation revenue servicing debt…” As Clyde Prestowitz pointed out in Three Billion New Capitalists (reviewed in Management Ausust 2005) there is increasing concern about America’s ability to fulfil its international financial obligations: the US trade (current account) deficit was about $650 billion in 2004, financed by huge overseas borrowing, and mortgaging large US assets to foreign lenders.
Deirdre Kent, previously the tenacious leader of the country’s anti-smoking lobby, has written an impeccably researched book that deserves to be read. It discusses, in an agreeably jargon-free and readable fashion, how the current system works, or doesn’t. It looks at complementary economies and monetary systems – at possible changes to taxation, community banking, commercial barter – that have been tried successfully in various parts of the world.
The increasingly stark reality is that unfettered, unthinking growth is now both unsustainable and increasingly unacceptable. Healthy Money, Healthy Planet should be a valuable resource in the essential, and overdue, debate on our economic options.
Rating 4
Planet
By: Deirdre Kent
Publisher: Craig Potton Publishing
Price: $34.99
Sustainability is a current buzz word among politicians and business leaders. It is on many lips; but lip service is about as far as it usually goes.
There’s barely even lip service paid to the idea that our present economic system is not sustainable. It’s a bit like democracy. Most of us accept it without question; some worry about it but decide the alternatives are worse. Yet there are growing doubts about the sustainability, the very survival of the economic system that makes most of the world go round, and that we all depend on so completely.
Deirdre Kent’s Healthy Money, Healthy Planet both confronts the realities and considers some of the alternatives. She argues, as do economists like Richard Douthwaite, that the present debt-based global economic system must continue to grow or it will collapse. “The ritual worship of the desirability of economic growth” can, she writes, be traced to capitalism’s total dependence on continuous economic growth because of the need to pay interest on borrowed money. Almost all our money supply is created by interest-bearing debt by private banks; the Reserve Bank has confirmed that only 2 percent of the money in use in New Zealand is created interest-free.
Collapse is not just a theoretical possibility: witness the Argentinian and Thai economies and Japan’s struggle with its banks’ bad debts for over a decade. “At the time of writing,” noted Kent, “Japan spends more than 40 percent of its taxation revenue servicing debt…” As Clyde Prestowitz pointed out in Three Billion New Capitalists (reviewed in Management Ausust 2005) there is increasing concern about America’s ability to fulfil its international financial obligations: the US trade (current account) deficit was about $650 billion in 2004, financed by huge overseas borrowing, and mortgaging large US assets to foreign lenders.
Deirdre Kent, previously the tenacious leader of the country’s anti-smoking lobby, has written an impeccably researched book that deserves to be read. It discusses, in an agreeably jargon-free and readable fashion, how the current system works, or doesn’t. It looks at complementary economies and monetary systems – at possible changes to taxation, community banking, commercial barter – that have been tried successfully in various parts of the world.
The increasingly stark reality is that unfettered, unthinking growth is now both unsustainable and increasingly unacceptable. Healthy Money, Healthy Planet should be a valuable resource in the essential, and overdue, debate on our economic options.
Rating 4
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
Paul Glover's review in Yes! Magazine
Review published in Yes! Magazine May 2006
Healthy Money Healthy Planet
by Deirdre Kent
reviewed by Paul Glover
There are already thousands of run-for-your-life crisis books. Celebrations of success are rarer. Deirdre Kent’s book Healthy Money, Healthy Planet is a fine contribution to the latter, a great find for those who want to convert bad news into good news that exemplifies the world we want.
Community currencies, for example, have begun to prove that economics and ecology can become friends. Local cash can fix problems that dollars ignore.
Healthy Money helps currency organizers more effectively explain the differences between money which connects people and money that controls people. Kent starts with an authoritative history of national money systems.
Commercial bankers create money just by signing loan contracts. Only ten percent of the dollars lent are backed by bank reserves; 90% are fantasy credits. Here’s the trick: the interest charged can never be repaid because, like musical chairs, the money lending game doesn’t provide enough credits for repaying both principle and interest. The resulting deliberate dollar scarcity forces a desperate scramble for sales regardless of damage to communities and nature.
Bankers foreclose the inevitable losers then control more wealth than ever. And control of money decides where jobs are available and for how long; decides who owns land and what gets built; decides what is legal and what’s a crime; decides who lives well and who struggles. (For a fuller discussion of money systems, see Thomas Greco, “The Trouble with Money,” and Bernard Lietaer, “Beyond Greed and Scarcity,” YES! Summer 1997.)
Why should bankers have all the fun? Healthy Money provides two essential tools to citizens creating community currency that’s dedicated to social justice, environmental repair, and neighborhoods. First, it introduces the varieties of grassroots credit systems and summarizes their strengths and weaknesses.
Kent compares the multitude of paper scrips, digital credits, smart cards, and barter banks. She prefers that monetary theorists take action, and risk blundering in the real world.
At the same time, Kent exhorts community organizers to act on the larger stage. She endorses “healthy globalization” for labor rights and environmental justice. She is enthusiastic about commodity-backed international currency (like the Borsodi Constant), and carbon emission rights currency. The Constant’s value was measured by aggregate current sales from harvests and mines, while trading the rights to spew carbon oxides seeks to cap global pollution. She recommends that currency activists learn business sense from those who comprehend profit and loss.
And since money when banked multiplies its force, community banking is considered just as necessary as community currency.
Some community currency advocates are skeptical of local currencies that are not backed by national currency. But all national currencies are in debt to nature, since modern economies extract resources faster than they replenish.
Even the United States’ dollar is backed no longer by vast domestic petroleum reserves, boundless woodlands and deep soils, nor by gold or silver, but by $6 trillion debt, rusting industry, and declining military control of foreign oil.
That’s why HOUR systems (ithacahours.com) are deliberately backed by local labor and sustainable partnership with nature. As the notes say, “HOURS are backed by real capital: our skills, our time, our tools, forests, fields and rivers.” When dollars, euros, yen and yuan fade, HOURS can take over.
Kent does not pretend to have written a how-to manual. She seems like a genial schoolteacher walking the rows, inviting our attention to choices. But Healthy Money prepares us well to understand finance, while making it serve our neighborhoods and revive the planet ourgrandchildren will inherit.
Paul Glover is founder of Ithaca HOURS, the Ithaca Health Alliance, and Citizen Planners of LosAngeles. He is a consultant for grassroots economic development: paulglover.org
____
Healthy Money Healthy Planet
by Deirdre Kent
reviewed by Paul Glover
There are already thousands of run-for-your-life crisis books. Celebrations of success are rarer. Deirdre Kent’s book Healthy Money, Healthy Planet is a fine contribution to the latter, a great find for those who want to convert bad news into good news that exemplifies the world we want.
Community currencies, for example, have begun to prove that economics and ecology can become friends. Local cash can fix problems that dollars ignore.
Healthy Money helps currency organizers more effectively explain the differences between money which connects people and money that controls people. Kent starts with an authoritative history of national money systems.
Commercial bankers create money just by signing loan contracts. Only ten percent of the dollars lent are backed by bank reserves; 90% are fantasy credits. Here’s the trick: the interest charged can never be repaid because, like musical chairs, the money lending game doesn’t provide enough credits for repaying both principle and interest. The resulting deliberate dollar scarcity forces a desperate scramble for sales regardless of damage to communities and nature.
Bankers foreclose the inevitable losers then control more wealth than ever. And control of money decides where jobs are available and for how long; decides who owns land and what gets built; decides what is legal and what’s a crime; decides who lives well and who struggles. (For a fuller discussion of money systems, see Thomas Greco, “The Trouble with Money,” and Bernard Lietaer, “Beyond Greed and Scarcity,” YES! Summer 1997.)
Why should bankers have all the fun? Healthy Money provides two essential tools to citizens creating community currency that’s dedicated to social justice, environmental repair, and neighborhoods. First, it introduces the varieties of grassroots credit systems and summarizes their strengths and weaknesses.
Kent compares the multitude of paper scrips, digital credits, smart cards, and barter banks. She prefers that monetary theorists take action, and risk blundering in the real world.
At the same time, Kent exhorts community organizers to act on the larger stage. She endorses “healthy globalization” for labor rights and environmental justice. She is enthusiastic about commodity-backed international currency (like the Borsodi Constant), and carbon emission rights currency. The Constant’s value was measured by aggregate current sales from harvests and mines, while trading the rights to spew carbon oxides seeks to cap global pollution. She recommends that currency activists learn business sense from those who comprehend profit and loss.
And since money when banked multiplies its force, community banking is considered just as necessary as community currency.
Some community currency advocates are skeptical of local currencies that are not backed by national currency. But all national currencies are in debt to nature, since modern economies extract resources faster than they replenish.
Even the United States’ dollar is backed no longer by vast domestic petroleum reserves, boundless woodlands and deep soils, nor by gold or silver, but by $6 trillion debt, rusting industry, and declining military control of foreign oil.
That’s why HOUR systems (ithacahours.com) are deliberately backed by local labor and sustainable partnership with nature. As the notes say, “HOURS are backed by real capital: our skills, our time, our tools, forests, fields and rivers.” When dollars, euros, yen and yuan fade, HOURS can take over.
Kent does not pretend to have written a how-to manual. She seems like a genial schoolteacher walking the rows, inviting our attention to choices. But Healthy Money prepares us well to understand finance, while making it serve our neighborhoods and revive the planet ourgrandchildren will inherit.
Paul Glover is founder of Ithaca HOURS, the Ithaca Health Alliance, and Citizen Planners of LosAngeles. He is a consultant for grassroots economic development: paulglover.org
____
Tuesday, June 27, 2006
I have been invited to Australia
On 13 July I am off to Australia with my partner Malcolm Murchie. I was invited by ERA (Economic Reform Australia) and will speak in five places – Brisbane, Maleny, Crystal Waters, Sydney and Adelaide.
The Brisbane event is at the conference of Students of Sustainability. I will be appearing with two others Professor Bob Blain of USA and Dr Geoff Davies of Canberra, author of Economiia. In Canberra we are at the Forum on Nature and Society, which sounds an interesting group.
Right now I am flat out preparing powerpoints which are up to date on local currencies. I have discovered that last week in New Zealand Greendollars Nelson New Zealand was launched by the owners of a commercial barter company OZONE. OZONE has 3000 trade members in New Zealand so the members of this new green dollars will be able to trade with 3000 businesses. I am keen to learn more.
We have to take three boxes of books with us for sale.
The Brisbane event is at the conference of Students of Sustainability. I will be appearing with two others Professor Bob Blain of USA and Dr Geoff Davies of Canberra, author of Economiia. In Canberra we are at the Forum on Nature and Society, which sounds an interesting group.
Right now I am flat out preparing powerpoints which are up to date on local currencies. I have discovered that last week in New Zealand Greendollars Nelson New Zealand was launched by the owners of a commercial barter company OZONE. OZONE has 3000 trade members in New Zealand so the members of this new green dollars will be able to trade with 3000 businesses. I am keen to learn more.
We have to take three boxes of books with us for sale.
Tuesday, May 30, 2006
A review in New Zealand Books from an economist
The following review appeared in the June 2006 edition of a publication called New Zealand Books. I am a little reluctant to put it on the website as it has a few inaccuracies. An author feels a little weird when someone gets a fact or two wrong..Anyway it seems he has cottoned on to what the book is about, particularly the chapter on diversity and on organic organisation and thinks it worthwhile reading. Some of his sentences are hard to understand and I am not sure that he reiterates or rephrases what I actually said. Deirdre
Current Account
Robin Johnson
Healthy Money Healthy Planet: Developing Sustainabiilty through new Money Systems
Deirdre Kent
Craig Potton Publishing $34.99
ISBN 1877333298
This book is a serious critique of orthodox economic writing and attempts to set out an alternative interpretation of the role of money in society. In particular, it attacks the creation of credit by the banking system and lack of controls over the money supply. The viewpoint is international as well as domestic and hence includes world monetary influences as well as those of particular countries. In summary the author deplores the concentration of wealth and power in a small percentage of the population, the undue influence of multinational corporations, the lack of regard for natural resources, and the baleful influence of international specialisation (world trade reform) on local economies.
The author presents a case for the reform of the money system consistent with a view of society that is self-reliant, environmentally friendly and helpful to all levels. She reviews what she calls complementary economic and monetary systems that might mitigates some of the worst features of the international monetary system she identifies. Complementary currencies are those set up to give the power to issue money to people at all levels of organisation. These have been developed in a number of countries, including New Zealand, and their implementation could overcome foreign or bank control of the money supply. If implemented they would require the introduction of community banking and local participation, the encouragement of commercial barter and exchange, enhanced local currency circulation and alternative means of exchange, like voucher schemes, in parallel with national and international systems.
For an economist this is a serious challenge, and, I believe Kent’s proposals are unlikely to be workable. However, for the non-economist, the book is an informative read on everyday aspects of the economy, particularly the workings of the monetary system and the author’s interpretation of it.
The title of the book derives from the author’s metaphor of an organic model for a healthy economy – thinking of it as a living system. It’s her view that in a healthy global economy there would be no essential conflict between what is good for the local region and what is good for the planet; and in a national economy, its parts, while competing for attention by demonstrating their uniqueness, should all cooperate and help each other at optimal capacity.
The author speaks of managed borders. In a human cell, if the cell membrane is removed, the contents will leak out and pathogens will enter the cell. While goods, services,, energy and money are all allowed to circulate freely within the economy, the borders should be managed to allow vital materials, energy and information to pass through. In an organic, hierarchic model each economy – supranational, national, regional, local and neighbourhood – would be a complete unit. To retain integrity each would have its own currency, while also using the national and international currencies for trade within the larger unit.
Kent follows other writers in this area by setting out operational characteristics of a healthy holarchic (a term said to come from Arthur Koestler, meaning that each living part of an organism is whole but also depends on cells around it; a group of such cells is a holarchy system). These characteristics are based on the following ecological principles: life is frugal and sharing; life depends on inclusive, place-based communities; life depends on boundaries; and life thrives on diversity, creative individuality and shared learning.
Theese propositions can be used to recreate economic institutions in the service of “life”. Thus:
"Human economies can and should function as self-organising systems in which each individual, family, community or nation is able to exercise its freedom of choice, mindful of the needs of the whole, and no entity has the power to dominate any other. Human economies can and should be organised to contribute to life’s abundance through frugal use, equitable sharing, and continuous recycling of the available energy and resources to meet the material, social and spiritual needs of all their members. Human economies can and should be built around inclusive, place based communities, adapted to the conditions of their physical space, adept at the collection and conversation of energy and recycling of materials to function as largely self-reliant entities, and organised to provide each of their members with a sustainable means of livelihood."
Human economies can and should acknowledge and reward cooperative behaviour towards the efficient use of energy and resources in providing adequate livelihoods for all and enhancing the productive capacities of a shared pool of living capital. Human economies can and should have managed borders at each level of organisation, from households and community to region and nation, which allow them to maintain the integrity, coherence and resource efficiency of their internal productive processes and to protect themselves from predators and pathogens while cooperating to enhance the potentials of the larger whole. Human economies can and should nurture cultural, social and economic creativity and diversity and share information within and between and between place-based economies. These conditions are the keys to system resilience and creative intelligence.
Now it seems to me that these social institutions are largely built around the Christian ethic and the efficient use of resources, and would be acceptable to economists and non-economists alike. Modern legislation also provides for the control of excessive monopolies and unfair competition, and international agreements are in place for sharing energy resources, preventing unfair trade and the control of bugs and disease (“predators and pathogens”). Where the two approaches seems to part is in the degree of control of local, national and international autonomy sanctioned by society. The author would prefer more local control over events, more self-sufficiency at the household and regional level, and less trade with other entities at all levels.
The political analyst is bound to point out that such an organisational change is well within the powers of democratic voting systems if sufficient people opt for it. The economic analyst would also have to point out that many social reforms of the kind prescribed can only be achieved by some loss of efficiency in the productive system. If there is a loss of efficiency in moving to such a system, there is less wealth to share among the unfortunate and the less advantaged. The very efficiencies gained from specialisation in trade at regional, national and international levels would be largely lost.
In the end it comes down to what kind of society we really want. We need to weigh the advantages and disadvantages of the various options. Most of us would vote for a caring, decently incomed, self-governing form of organisation if the benefits were clear. It could be that the information we have available is insufficient to make a constructive choice – a point suggested in the last of the aboe forms of organisation. Perhaps the most positive aspect of this book is that it exposes much new information and a new view on a subject that concerns everybody; a reading of its contents might influence ways our society might move in the future.
Robin Johnson is an economist and retired civil servant.
Current Account
Robin Johnson
Healthy Money Healthy Planet: Developing Sustainabiilty through new Money Systems
Deirdre Kent
Craig Potton Publishing $34.99
ISBN 1877333298
This book is a serious critique of orthodox economic writing and attempts to set out an alternative interpretation of the role of money in society. In particular, it attacks the creation of credit by the banking system and lack of controls over the money supply. The viewpoint is international as well as domestic and hence includes world monetary influences as well as those of particular countries. In summary the author deplores the concentration of wealth and power in a small percentage of the population, the undue influence of multinational corporations, the lack of regard for natural resources, and the baleful influence of international specialisation (world trade reform) on local economies.
The author presents a case for the reform of the money system consistent with a view of society that is self-reliant, environmentally friendly and helpful to all levels. She reviews what she calls complementary economic and monetary systems that might mitigates some of the worst features of the international monetary system she identifies. Complementary currencies are those set up to give the power to issue money to people at all levels of organisation. These have been developed in a number of countries, including New Zealand, and their implementation could overcome foreign or bank control of the money supply. If implemented they would require the introduction of community banking and local participation, the encouragement of commercial barter and exchange, enhanced local currency circulation and alternative means of exchange, like voucher schemes, in parallel with national and international systems.
For an economist this is a serious challenge, and, I believe Kent’s proposals are unlikely to be workable. However, for the non-economist, the book is an informative read on everyday aspects of the economy, particularly the workings of the monetary system and the author’s interpretation of it.
The title of the book derives from the author’s metaphor of an organic model for a healthy economy – thinking of it as a living system. It’s her view that in a healthy global economy there would be no essential conflict between what is good for the local region and what is good for the planet; and in a national economy, its parts, while competing for attention by demonstrating their uniqueness, should all cooperate and help each other at optimal capacity.
The author speaks of managed borders. In a human cell, if the cell membrane is removed, the contents will leak out and pathogens will enter the cell. While goods, services,, energy and money are all allowed to circulate freely within the economy, the borders should be managed to allow vital materials, energy and information to pass through. In an organic, hierarchic model each economy – supranational, national, regional, local and neighbourhood – would be a complete unit. To retain integrity each would have its own currency, while also using the national and international currencies for trade within the larger unit.
Kent follows other writers in this area by setting out operational characteristics of a healthy holarchic (a term said to come from Arthur Koestler, meaning that each living part of an organism is whole but also depends on cells around it; a group of such cells is a holarchy system). These characteristics are based on the following ecological principles: life is frugal and sharing; life depends on inclusive, place-based communities; life depends on boundaries; and life thrives on diversity, creative individuality and shared learning.
Theese propositions can be used to recreate economic institutions in the service of “life”. Thus:
"Human economies can and should function as self-organising systems in which each individual, family, community or nation is able to exercise its freedom of choice, mindful of the needs of the whole, and no entity has the power to dominate any other. Human economies can and should be organised to contribute to life’s abundance through frugal use, equitable sharing, and continuous recycling of the available energy and resources to meet the material, social and spiritual needs of all their members. Human economies can and should be built around inclusive, place based communities, adapted to the conditions of their physical space, adept at the collection and conversation of energy and recycling of materials to function as largely self-reliant entities, and organised to provide each of their members with a sustainable means of livelihood."
Human economies can and should acknowledge and reward cooperative behaviour towards the efficient use of energy and resources in providing adequate livelihoods for all and enhancing the productive capacities of a shared pool of living capital. Human economies can and should have managed borders at each level of organisation, from households and community to region and nation, which allow them to maintain the integrity, coherence and resource efficiency of their internal productive processes and to protect themselves from predators and pathogens while cooperating to enhance the potentials of the larger whole. Human economies can and should nurture cultural, social and economic creativity and diversity and share information within and between and between place-based economies. These conditions are the keys to system resilience and creative intelligence.
Now it seems to me that these social institutions are largely built around the Christian ethic and the efficient use of resources, and would be acceptable to economists and non-economists alike. Modern legislation also provides for the control of excessive monopolies and unfair competition, and international agreements are in place for sharing energy resources, preventing unfair trade and the control of bugs and disease (“predators and pathogens”). Where the two approaches seems to part is in the degree of control of local, national and international autonomy sanctioned by society. The author would prefer more local control over events, more self-sufficiency at the household and regional level, and less trade with other entities at all levels.
The political analyst is bound to point out that such an organisational change is well within the powers of democratic voting systems if sufficient people opt for it. The economic analyst would also have to point out that many social reforms of the kind prescribed can only be achieved by some loss of efficiency in the productive system. If there is a loss of efficiency in moving to such a system, there is less wealth to share among the unfortunate and the less advantaged. The very efficiencies gained from specialisation in trade at regional, national and international levels would be largely lost.
In the end it comes down to what kind of society we really want. We need to weigh the advantages and disadvantages of the various options. Most of us would vote for a caring, decently incomed, self-governing form of organisation if the benefits were clear. It could be that the information we have available is insufficient to make a constructive choice – a point suggested in the last of the aboe forms of organisation. Perhaps the most positive aspect of this book is that it exposes much new information and a new view on a subject that concerns everybody; a reading of its contents might influence ways our society might move in the future.
Robin Johnson is an economist and retired civil servant.
Thursday, March 23, 2006
Rachel McAlpine reviews book for Kapiti Observer
Review by Rachel McAlpine in Kapiti Observer, 23 March, 2006
Healthy Money Healthy Planet: Developing Sustainability through new money systems, by Deirdre Kent, Craig Potton Publishing.
A new book from Deirdre Kent of Waikanae is in tune with the ideals of Craig Potton Publishing, who produce ‘occasional, but important books on a variety of social and environmental issues.’
What have money systems to do with a healthy planet? The answer is shocking and incredible.
‘The national currency of industrialised nations is created when commercial banks issue loans’, explains Deirdre Kent. ‘Banks created the loan but not the interest to pay it back.”
Thus our economy depends on a shortage of currency, and industrialised nations are all, by definition, eternally, inevitably, permanently, hopelessly in debt. This forces economic growth, which damages our planet. All any government can do is twiddle with the details, if I have got the message right.
To abolish the world monetary system is not realistic, and Deirdre Kent does not suggest such a thing.
But local, complementary currencies can and do coexist, with many benefits.
The book includes a fascinating overview of ‘healthy’ money systems.
Examples in New Zealand include Green dollars, Chatham Island Notes, Flybuys, Air New Zealand Airpoints Dollars, Bartercard and Tradecard. The policies of our big banks are compared with those of Kiwibank, the credit unions and community banks.
This is a lively book about a timely topic that most people barely think about. It is by a non-economist for non-economists – a refreshing approach.
The author repeatedly strikes a note of moderation, for example by quoting JK Galbraith: ‘A constant in the history of money is that every remedy is reliably a source of new abuse.’
(Let me declare my interest: Deirdre Kent is my sister)
Healthy Money Healthy Planet: Developing Sustainability through new money systems, by Deirdre Kent, Craig Potton Publishing.
A new book from Deirdre Kent of Waikanae is in tune with the ideals of Craig Potton Publishing, who produce ‘occasional, but important books on a variety of social and environmental issues.’
What have money systems to do with a healthy planet? The answer is shocking and incredible.
‘The national currency of industrialised nations is created when commercial banks issue loans’, explains Deirdre Kent. ‘Banks created the loan but not the interest to pay it back.”
Thus our economy depends on a shortage of currency, and industrialised nations are all, by definition, eternally, inevitably, permanently, hopelessly in debt. This forces economic growth, which damages our planet. All any government can do is twiddle with the details, if I have got the message right.
To abolish the world monetary system is not realistic, and Deirdre Kent does not suggest such a thing.
But local, complementary currencies can and do coexist, with many benefits.
The book includes a fascinating overview of ‘healthy’ money systems.
Examples in New Zealand include Green dollars, Chatham Island Notes, Flybuys, Air New Zealand Airpoints Dollars, Bartercard and Tradecard. The policies of our big banks are compared with those of Kiwibank, the credit unions and community banks.
This is a lively book about a timely topic that most people barely think about. It is by a non-economist for non-economists – a refreshing approach.
The author repeatedly strikes a note of moderation, for example by quoting JK Galbraith: ‘A constant in the history of money is that every remedy is reliably a source of new abuse.’
(Let me declare my interest: Deirdre Kent is my sister)
Wednesday, February 22, 2006
Organic pathways website reviews book
This is a New Zealand website for those interested in organics. It has published the following review.
Money, Healthy Planet
Developing Sustainability Through New Money Systems
Deirdre Kent
In her preface to Healthy Money Healthy Planet, author New Zealander Deirdre Kent says the book is her contribution to the conversation on how to preserve the planet and resolve economic injustices.
She calls the way money currently operates “sick money” and here’s why:
Income Disparity In New Zealand, since the 1980s, the highest income families have increased their share of income - the top 10 per cent has gained, the next 20 per cent is holding their own.
Meanwhile, the bottom 70 per cent are worse off than 10 years ago.
In 1960, the wealthiest 20 per cent of the world’s population, living in the richest countries, had 30 times the income of the poorest 20 per cent. By 1977, the figure had increased to 74 times.
The assets of the world’s 358 billionaires exceed the combined annual incomes of countries accounting for 2.3 billion people or nearly half the world’s people.
Debt US$40 billion a year flows from developing countries to the developed countries and the developing world now spends US$13 on debt repayment for every US$1 it receives in grants.
As a result of the debt crisis, 7 million children die each year.
Money Creation Healthy Money, Healthy Planet describes how money currently works and shows how increasing financial inequality is built into the system.
She maintains that many of the environmental and social problems result from the creation of money out of thin air by private banks as interest bearing debt. She describes how it works and explains why some central bankers, economists and politicians deny that this is how money works.
Kent is in favour of loans being made, but says the payment of interest on top of the loan creates a situation where there is never enough money in circulation to cover the interest, in practice meaning there must be winners and losers in the current economic system.
In a section on the invisible governments, she lists “secretive” organizations that are dominated by big business interests and that seek to influence governments - powerful and unaccountable groups which make democracy impotent.
Organic Model She explains how healthy money would be the result if the economy was built on an organic model where power is not centralized, and money can also be created at the regional level and used to revitalize regional economies.
She envisages economies nested in economies using a pattern which mimics nature, and which will help keep money circulating at the local and national level, instead of being a one way flow toward oversized points of power as currently happens.
Monetary literacy for the masses Kent is a New Zealand grandmother with a lifelong involvement in political issues, and an interest in challenging underlying assumptions and beliefs, she has always been interested in mathematics (and was a maths teacher).
She advocates monetary literacy for the ordinary person and says economics permeates our lives and is far too important to be left solely to economists. Her book is a good starting point for newcomers as it is written in layperson’s language.
It is also a useful resource for people already interested in monetary reform as it assesses a number of complementary economic and monetary systems which have been tried in various countries, including New Zealand.
Monetary reform resource She assesses the strengths and weaknesses of various currencies, looking at why some have worked and others failed - thus providing a useful reference for people wanting to set up complementary currencies, for instance, which would work alongside the national currency, but would return power to the grassroots level and encourage regional rejuvenation.
Her book includes a table of currencies with their strengths and weaknesses, and a list of useful websites in categories including Green economics, history and theory of money, monetary reform, GDP, organic model of organization, various currencies and ethical investments.
It also lists useful organizations in New Zealand and Australia and has an extensive bibliography. A glossary is a good aid to people taking their first steps in economic literacy.
Craig Potton Publishing
RRP: $34.95
Available from
H. Dew
Living Economies
12 Costley St
Carterton
Money, Healthy Planet
Developing Sustainability Through New Money Systems
Deirdre Kent
In her preface to Healthy Money Healthy Planet, author New Zealander Deirdre Kent says the book is her contribution to the conversation on how to preserve the planet and resolve economic injustices.
She calls the way money currently operates “sick money” and here’s why:
Income Disparity In New Zealand, since the 1980s, the highest income families have increased their share of income - the top 10 per cent has gained, the next 20 per cent is holding their own.
Meanwhile, the bottom 70 per cent are worse off than 10 years ago.
In 1960, the wealthiest 20 per cent of the world’s population, living in the richest countries, had 30 times the income of the poorest 20 per cent. By 1977, the figure had increased to 74 times.
The assets of the world’s 358 billionaires exceed the combined annual incomes of countries accounting for 2.3 billion people or nearly half the world’s people.
Debt US$40 billion a year flows from developing countries to the developed countries and the developing world now spends US$13 on debt repayment for every US$1 it receives in grants.
As a result of the debt crisis, 7 million children die each year.
Money Creation Healthy Money, Healthy Planet describes how money currently works and shows how increasing financial inequality is built into the system.
She maintains that many of the environmental and social problems result from the creation of money out of thin air by private banks as interest bearing debt. She describes how it works and explains why some central bankers, economists and politicians deny that this is how money works.
Kent is in favour of loans being made, but says the payment of interest on top of the loan creates a situation where there is never enough money in circulation to cover the interest, in practice meaning there must be winners and losers in the current economic system.
In a section on the invisible governments, she lists “secretive” organizations that are dominated by big business interests and that seek to influence governments - powerful and unaccountable groups which make democracy impotent.
Organic Model She explains how healthy money would be the result if the economy was built on an organic model where power is not centralized, and money can also be created at the regional level and used to revitalize regional economies.
She envisages economies nested in economies using a pattern which mimics nature, and which will help keep money circulating at the local and national level, instead of being a one way flow toward oversized points of power as currently happens.
Monetary literacy for the masses Kent is a New Zealand grandmother with a lifelong involvement in political issues, and an interest in challenging underlying assumptions and beliefs, she has always been interested in mathematics (and was a maths teacher).
She advocates monetary literacy for the ordinary person and says economics permeates our lives and is far too important to be left solely to economists. Her book is a good starting point for newcomers as it is written in layperson’s language.
It is also a useful resource for people already interested in monetary reform as it assesses a number of complementary economic and monetary systems which have been tried in various countries, including New Zealand.
Monetary reform resource She assesses the strengths and weaknesses of various currencies, looking at why some have worked and others failed - thus providing a useful reference for people wanting to set up complementary currencies, for instance, which would work alongside the national currency, but would return power to the grassroots level and encourage regional rejuvenation.
Her book includes a table of currencies with their strengths and weaknesses, and a list of useful websites in categories including Green economics, history and theory of money, monetary reform, GDP, organic model of organization, various currencies and ethical investments.
It also lists useful organizations in New Zealand and Australia and has an extensive bibliography. A glossary is a good aid to people taking their first steps in economic literacy.
Craig Potton Publishing
RRP: $34.95
Available from
H. Dew
Living Economies
12 Costley St
Carterton
Sunday, December 18, 2005
More people give positive feedback
I have received a Christmas card from Sue Kedgley , Green MP, with the words "Great book
Deirdre". Then yesterday I saw Emily Williams at a party who said she had read it now
as well as Gary and she could understand it all and very much liked it. She was surprised she had enjoyed a book on economics so much. Then last night there was a phone call from a Democrat friend of Malcolm's in Oamaru
who was just delighted, couldn't believe Malcolm's partner was 'so
clever'.
So that's good. It is nice to have all those comments come back personally.
Deirdre". Then yesterday I saw Emily Williams at a party who said she had read it now
as well as Gary and she could understand it all and very much liked it. She was surprised she had enjoyed a book on economics so much. Then last night there was a phone call from a Democrat friend of Malcolm's in Oamaru
who was just delighted, couldn't believe Malcolm's partner was 'so
clever'.
So that's good. It is nice to have all those comments come back personally.
Friday, December 02, 2005
Deirdre Kent
Hi everyone. I thought I would add another photo, mostly to have practice with uploading photos from my flickr site. If one gets out of practice things tend to get forgotten.
The Methodist paper reviews the book
Review in Touchstone, the Methodist Church’s newspaper, November 2005
Healthy Money Healthy Planet: Developing Sustainability through New Money Systems
Reviewer: Rinny Westra
YOU CANNOT SERVE God and Money, said Jesus. But whether we like it or not, those of us who claim to serve God also tend to serve what the author describes as “dirty money”. This is the money created as interest-bearing debt by private banks, but with the approval of the Reserve Bank.
It is this money creation that drives economic growth, and that commits us to a growing rather than a sustainable economy. In such a system there are always losers, because people and firms must go further into debt to avoid economic collapse. Consequences include the growing gap between rich and poor, the horrific indebtedness of the Third World, and the degrading of the environment.
The author spends the first part of the book outlining the dire situation that the dogmatic commitment to ‘dirty money’ is driving us into. Unlimited economic growth on a planet with finite resources does not make sense.
The author does not leave it there. The second part of her book outlines ways in which ‘healthy money’ i.e. money that is not interest-bearing and that serves solely as a means of exchange, can be created.
She recommends local currencies that are complementary to the official currency. These include initiatives like Green Dollars (less popular now than they were in the 1980s and 1990s) and commercial barter through schemes like Bartercard. She presents lots of constructive detail from all over the world in this part of the book.
Much research has gone into this, and the vision that she creates is a compelling one. She bases economics on ecology, and brings reality to what is often an arid discipline that is far removed from the realities of life.
Did you know that according to the standard measurements of GDP ‘Being pregnant, chasing toddlers and breast feeding do not add to the GDP, but looking after other people’s children in a day-care centre does.’ That “If we hang our washing on the line we do nothing for the economy, but by placing it in the dryer we are helping.”? (P72)
As someone who has spent a brief time teaching economics, I would have appreciated this book, as well as Marilyn Waring’s Counting for Nothing, as offering an important alternative to the irrational commitment to economic fundamentalism (‘there is no alternative’) that has been so dominant in the economic and business discourse of the past two decades. May it help reshape our thinking, our money system and our dog-eat-dog society.
This book also has appendices listing useful websites and organisations, as well as a very good glossary.
Healthy Money Healthy Planet: Developing Sustainability through New Money Systems
Reviewer: Rinny Westra
YOU CANNOT SERVE God and Money, said Jesus. But whether we like it or not, those of us who claim to serve God also tend to serve what the author describes as “dirty money”. This is the money created as interest-bearing debt by private banks, but with the approval of the Reserve Bank.
It is this money creation that drives economic growth, and that commits us to a growing rather than a sustainable economy. In such a system there are always losers, because people and firms must go further into debt to avoid economic collapse. Consequences include the growing gap between rich and poor, the horrific indebtedness of the Third World, and the degrading of the environment.
The author spends the first part of the book outlining the dire situation that the dogmatic commitment to ‘dirty money’ is driving us into. Unlimited economic growth on a planet with finite resources does not make sense.
The author does not leave it there. The second part of her book outlines ways in which ‘healthy money’ i.e. money that is not interest-bearing and that serves solely as a means of exchange, can be created.
She recommends local currencies that are complementary to the official currency. These include initiatives like Green Dollars (less popular now than they were in the 1980s and 1990s) and commercial barter through schemes like Bartercard. She presents lots of constructive detail from all over the world in this part of the book.
Much research has gone into this, and the vision that she creates is a compelling one. She bases economics on ecology, and brings reality to what is often an arid discipline that is far removed from the realities of life.
Did you know that according to the standard measurements of GDP ‘Being pregnant, chasing toddlers and breast feeding do not add to the GDP, but looking after other people’s children in a day-care centre does.’ That “If we hang our washing on the line we do nothing for the economy, but by placing it in the dryer we are helping.”? (P72)
As someone who has spent a brief time teaching economics, I would have appreciated this book, as well as Marilyn Waring’s Counting for Nothing, as offering an important alternative to the irrational commitment to economic fundamentalism (‘there is no alternative’) that has been so dominant in the economic and business discourse of the past two decades. May it help reshape our thinking, our money system and our dog-eat-dog society.
This book also has appendices listing useful websites and organisations, as well as a very good glossary.
Saturday, November 26, 2005
NZ Green Party magazine reviews the book
HEALTHY MONEY HEALTHY PLANET
Reviewed by Brian Westbrooke for Te Awa, The River, Magazine of the Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand
We often think of money as something tangible like notes and coins. A moment’s reflection provides a reality check. Most money, from our bank account balances and mortgages to our wages and EFTPOS transactions at the supermarket, is imaginary and electronic. Only 2% of New Zealand’s money supply is state issued currency. All other money is based upon private debt, a pyramid of mortgages, loans and overdrafts created by banks.
Deirdre Kent’s Healthy Money Healthy Planet offers an accessible and readable critique of our monetary system and a comprehensive review of alternative currencies and community banking systems from a New Zealand perspective.
Part One describes the organisation of our diseased monetary and banking institutions, explaining how banks create money through the money multiplier effect in an easily understandable way. The author shows why our monetary system, based upon interest bearing debt, will collapse unless more money is continually created, and how this money supply expansion creates relentless pressure for economic growth.
Over the term of a typical housing mortgage, for example, a borrower will, with interest, repay more that twice the amount borrowed.
Banks do not directly lend the interest component of these repayments into existence. For borrowers to meet their commitments, new debt money must be continually be created elsewhere in the financial system. Borrowers must ceaselessly engage in competitive economic activity to produce goods and services in a struggle to obtain such money from others. Paradoxically, our monetary system creates a continual scarcity of money for many whilst also propelling expansion of the total money supply.
The book reveals that New Zealand’s money supply has grown phenomenally since banking industry deregulation in the 1980s. Household mortgage debt, constituting over 60% of our money supply, grew from 3.7 billion in 1978 to 81 billion in 2003, a rise of more than 2000 percent over 25 years! The money upon which our economy relies largely created through an increasing housing debt burden (and rising house prices)
The second part of the book examines alternative healthy currencies and community banking systems from around the world that produce more socially and economically desirable outcomes.
Kent argues that the first step towards a healthy monetary system is the development of local currencies and banking systems based upon mutual exchange. These would not be founded in interest bearing debt, and would exist alongside national and international currencies.
Although it does not offer a simple panacea for our problems, monetary reform is crucial to the creation of a substantial society. Healthy Money Healthy Planet is a very useful starting point for those who wish to know more about our diseased monetary system and alternatives to it.
For more information go to: www.le.org.nz?tiki-index.php?Page=SustainableMoney
Reviewed by Brian Westbrooke for Te Awa, The River, Magazine of the Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand
We often think of money as something tangible like notes and coins. A moment’s reflection provides a reality check. Most money, from our bank account balances and mortgages to our wages and EFTPOS transactions at the supermarket, is imaginary and electronic. Only 2% of New Zealand’s money supply is state issued currency. All other money is based upon private debt, a pyramid of mortgages, loans and overdrafts created by banks.
Deirdre Kent’s Healthy Money Healthy Planet offers an accessible and readable critique of our monetary system and a comprehensive review of alternative currencies and community banking systems from a New Zealand perspective.
Part One describes the organisation of our diseased monetary and banking institutions, explaining how banks create money through the money multiplier effect in an easily understandable way. The author shows why our monetary system, based upon interest bearing debt, will collapse unless more money is continually created, and how this money supply expansion creates relentless pressure for economic growth.
Over the term of a typical housing mortgage, for example, a borrower will, with interest, repay more that twice the amount borrowed.
Banks do not directly lend the interest component of these repayments into existence. For borrowers to meet their commitments, new debt money must be continually be created elsewhere in the financial system. Borrowers must ceaselessly engage in competitive economic activity to produce goods and services in a struggle to obtain such money from others. Paradoxically, our monetary system creates a continual scarcity of money for many whilst also propelling expansion of the total money supply.
The book reveals that New Zealand’s money supply has grown phenomenally since banking industry deregulation in the 1980s. Household mortgage debt, constituting over 60% of our money supply, grew from 3.7 billion in 1978 to 81 billion in 2003, a rise of more than 2000 percent over 25 years! The money upon which our economy relies largely created through an increasing housing debt burden (and rising house prices)
The second part of the book examines alternative healthy currencies and community banking systems from around the world that produce more socially and economically desirable outcomes.
Kent argues that the first step towards a healthy monetary system is the development of local currencies and banking systems based upon mutual exchange. These would not be founded in interest bearing debt, and would exist alongside national and international currencies.
Although it does not offer a simple panacea for our problems, monetary reform is crucial to the creation of a substantial society. Healthy Money Healthy Planet is a very useful starting point for those who wish to know more about our diseased monetary system and alternatives to it.
For more information go to: www.le.org.nz?tiki-index.php?Page=SustainableMoney
Thursday, October 27, 2005
Comment from Daniel Evans of barter-software.com
Well it is good to know the book is being read now by at least one commercial barter company. Daniel Evans, who has just sold Ozone New Zealand, but is the Chief Information Office of XO Limited, a software development company based in Auckland, New Zealand, writes one day:
"I have actually read your book - and passed it onto the local Ozone operator here. It is very impressive. Quite a few people seem to be handing it around. " In a later email he says:
"Yep - Jo gave me the book. In turn I bought some copies and gave them to Seeby Woodhouse (the Ozone owner for NZ) and Josh Webb (his partner) and the Ozone franchise owner for Australia and another green-dollar person in Australia.. (or rather someone who wanted to start their own exchange).
It was very interesting."
Daniel's company has developed software for use by comercial barter companies and LETS systems.
I also discovered today that the owner of an organics shop in Wellington has read it too.
"I have actually read your book - and passed it onto the local Ozone operator here. It is very impressive. Quite a few people seem to be handing it around. " In a later email he says:
"Yep - Jo gave me the book. In turn I bought some copies and gave them to Seeby Woodhouse (the Ozone owner for NZ) and Josh Webb (his partner) and the Ozone franchise owner for Australia and another green-dollar person in Australia.. (or rather someone who wanted to start their own exchange).
It was very interesting."
Daniel's company has developed software for use by comercial barter companies and LETS systems.
I also discovered today that the owner of an organics shop in Wellington has read it too.
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