Healthy Money Healthy Planet - library.uniteddiversity.coop

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trading. We therefore need decentralisation so that there is a variety of issuing
banks operating at every level. This calls for ongoing negotiations between
organisations in control of the money supply so that inflation is kept in check.
With a good balance between cooperation and competition, these local monetary
authorities should, as a group, be able to develop a self­correcting mechanism for
keeping inflation at bay.
Financing Investments
It is often claimed that parallel or complementary currencies are unable to finance
investments. While it is true that neither green dollars nor time dollars are usable
for big­ticket items, partly because they are so minor in scale and partly because
they are not bankable, certain complementary currencies are not only able to fund
long­term investments but can actually positively encourage them.
Let’s take the case of a regional currency with a circulation fee built in. With
a penalty charge for hoarding, the value of this money does not increase over time.
Because it has lost its advantage over goods in this way, it will not accumulate and
cannot theoretically be used for financing investments. While savings accounts in
such a system will be exempt from demurrage and therefore will hold their value,
they will not grow as the money is interest­free. So instead of investment coming
from such savings, it must come from elsewhere. This is where the anti­hoarding
mechanism comes into effect, because once people in such a system have bought