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“What currently dominates would politics and economics is not a true conspiracy; it’s a mistake. It is a conspiracy of error. We are witnessing the collective pursuit of an inoperable political ideal and an erroneous economic paradigm, built on a totally inadequate, misunderstood and almost unchallenged financial system.”

This quote above is taken from the book ‘The Grip of Death; A study of modern money, debt slavery and destructive economics’ by Michael Rowbothan. Don’t be put off by the title (‘Grip of death’ is actually the literal translation of 'mortgage' - the things that started this whole credit crisis) because this book does a very good job at explaining the roots of the financial problems we are currently facing. Even better, it even offers solutions. I highly recommend reading it.

The insight that the book offers is highlighted by the fact that it was written in 1998; well before the financial crisis that is unfolding around us. The global financial problems are not a glitch in the system that we can fix and move on; we are coming to the point where the money-as-debt system will succumb under its own weight. You simply cannot solve a debt crisis with more debt; although that is exactly what governments are trying to do.

I find it incredible that three years into this crisis, there is still hardly any debate on what money IS; debt. No debt, no money. It is impossible to repay our debts because it would leave us without money. At the same it is becoming impossible to pay the interest on the debts. Catch-22.

We are at the beginning of the ‘end game’ of our financial system. The volatility on the financial markets is just one of the signs that we are reaching the mathematical end of our debt-based casino-speculation financial system.

What we need is a monetary system that is not based on debt. Where a euro in somebody’s pocket doesn’t necessarily mean a euro of debt for somebody else. A system where money is used as a means for trading and storing value instead of runaway speculation and useless financial derivatives. Instead of being the ultimate goal, money should be like oil in an engine used to facilitate transactions.

Want to know more? Read the book. Although it is a bit antagonistic towards our capitalistic system at certain points, it is a great alternative to accepted theory. And to understand where the author is coming from, maybe start by reading the last chapter: ‘A spectrum of opportunity’. Puts the whole thing in perspective…

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A few days ago I watched the documentary ‘The money fix’. The movie starts with a very good explanation of what money is and how the monetary system works. If you haven’t seen the series ‘Money as Debt’ (1&2) that I posted about earlier, this is definitely a good place to get started. The second part of the documentary is about alterative currency systems such as the time-dollar.

All alternative currencies try to solve the same problem: we are immensely productive and yet we get a feeling of scarcity. We have huge global, regional and local problems that need to be solved but don’t get done because of a lack of money. At the same time we have millions of people that are unemployed and can’t find work. There is a problem of allocation, and money – or rather the lack thereof - is the cause.

Money will always be scarce because it is created as debt while the interest to be paid on these loans is not created (this is very well explained in this documentary). One solution is to transfer the right to create money from (central) banks to the government. The government can spend money into creation interest free and control the money supply through taxation.

This documentary goes one step further and proposes a ‘mutual credit system’. In this system money is essentially created by the people themselves. If I put effort in to the system – for example by working for one hour – I get one time dollar. The person ‘buying’ my time is one time-dollar down. When I spend that dollar the reverse is the case. People can have positive and negative balances but the sum of money in the system is always zero. Moreover, no interest is paid.

This makes for a very stable system that – according to those that have tried – creates a feeling of abundance. In my opinion this is not to be mistaken with true abundance as a perceived future by some people (amongst others Jacques Fresco of the Zeitgeist movement).

Our wants are endless. And so are – to a certain degree – human labour, energy from the sun and the power of the waves. Unfortunately this abundance is contrasted by scarcity of non-renewable resources and surface space on earth. By the nature of these resources, this scarcity will never be solved (until we enter the age of space colonisation?).

The difference with nature – which is based on abundance – is that nature takes only what it needs while humans take more than that. Human beings don’t only have needs, but also (insatiable) wants based on our fancies, fantasies and dreams. It is this that makes us human, makes life interesting, and drives our development. At the same time it makes that we will never be free from this feeling of scarcity.

As a society we have to solve the money problem in order to save our commons and redistribute the wealth available on the planet. But I fear we cannot be saved from scarcity. Maybe it is like ups and downs; you can’t have one without the other. Without scarcity we cannot be overjoyed by abundance. The challenge then, is to redistribute scarcity and abundance more equally around the world.

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