Natural Time Currency

In the beginning was barter. It was inconvenient. We defined shells, metal plates, ornate paper, styled plastic, crypto-electrons as acceptable mediums of exchange.

Then came the powerful and usurped the right to create currency; and underpay services, and indebt friends.

Then the rat race commenced.

Then emerged the outstanding ailments: credit, interest, exchange rate, volatility of value.

And thus a new system of servitude evolved.

Fast forward to another time (and maybe galaxy) and imagine.

We are born with a natural currency in our possession - time. We exchange time for knowledge, skills, money, energy, sustenance, luxury, power.

Underlying all exchanges is still the currency of time that bears some unique properties:

• it is unmutable in value
• it is created naturally at a constant rate
• it requires no proof (of authority, of work) except ownership
• creation thereof is not transferable
• earning is not transferable (producer persons get revenue)
• value (prices) is unchanged by supply of money

We use time as production value:

• it takes 1 hour to grow 10 kg of potato
• it takes 1 hour to create 1 W of energy
• it takes 1h to cut hair
• it takes 1 hour to extract 2 kg of iron ore
• it takes 1 hour to melt 2 kg of iron ore into 1 kg of iron (accumulated cost is 2 h per 1 kg iron)
• it takes 1 hour to create iron scissors using 0.2 kg of iron (accumulated cost is 1.4 h)

We use time as currency of exchange and source of wealth and prosperity:

• The producer naturally creates 24 h per day (basic income) time currency. In addition, he creates 1.4 h of income from the sale of scissors.
• The customer naturally creates 24 h per day (basic income) time currency. He uses 1.4 h to buy scissors.
• a group of 20 people together produce 1000 kg of apples in 10 days (10 h per day). Each person earns 5 h. Each kg apple costs 0.1 h.

Further discussion:

• we eliminate the effect of oversupply of currency (as production value and price remain unchanged)
• people not able to work still earn a basic income
• the extrinsic motivation to work remains and is currency (time) earned
• bad players will attempt to game the system (debt,fraud) if you let them (so means of prevention and education are of major importance) and spoil the fun by the mere fact that they exist, which is not a problem of currency but a social problem (of education, policing, deterrents, prevention, civism).
• time based currency still represents desired basic functions: medium of exchange, unit of measurement, store of wealth
• transfer of currency (contractual) problems (donations, credit, debt, welfare, taxes, producer/consumer relations) remain unchanged
• credit is a social problem of contract, not a problem of currency; credit creates contractual dependency that may result in unlawful indenture (law problem)
• transfer of currency (donation, borrowing, credit) is like buying transactions; no distinction here
• interest is unlawful creation of value; interest is biased and a prejudice to one party, does not represent interests of both parties; interest is replaced by service costs to administer the credit; service cost depend on work invested but are independent of credit value
• a patient (without savings) requiring expensive apparatus that costs more than the basic income rate is paid by donations or credit.
• transfers between producers and consumers
• 1 producer : 1 consumer - direct transfer
• N producer : 1 consumer - split of income to all producers
• 1 producer : N consumer - split of payment to all consumers
• N producer : N consumer - split of payment, split of income
• tax is not a currency problem; it is a problem of managing investment; e.g. common infrastructure (road, rail, well) must be paid by all citizens before availability (investment), e.g. 1000 h building costs for a small village of 10 calculated over 10 years requires an annual fee of 10 h per citizen over 10 years or 100 h immediate invest from liquid sources or from savings. Tax is an alternative for managing common savings and is a governance (political) management problem.
• inflation is part of the problem of value and volatility of value of currencies (as is exchange rates, disparate monetary value of work hour between regions, national buying power) which is remedied by a time based currency.
• the value of goods is an economic management problem of uncoordinated production and procurement, of undervalue (oversupply) or overvalue (overdemand), not a problem of currency.
• time based currency eliminates artificial adjustments of currency and product values; therefore it eliminates regional differences between continents and nations; therefore it eliminated the need for regional production specialization; therefore it makes local production sustainable; therefore it reduces pollution from transportation.

Takeaways derived from the above discussion

• many of the problems related to money today are not currency related problems, i.e. those problems will not be solved by changing the currency type.
• some problems with money (volatility, value, inflation) can be eliminated by utilizing a natural time based currency.

Dictionary

• money is the conceptual abstraction of financial assests and transactions
• currency is the practical implementation of money