CHAPTER SEVEN PRACTICAL CASES TODAY: EMBRYOS OF A NEW ECONOMY THERE ARE TWO major obstacles preventing the practical conversion of our interest-based money into a means of exchange which would serve everyone. First: Few people seem to understand the problem, and secondly, successful experiments are thinly spread all over the world in comparison to "normal" money trade. Taken as a group though, these experiments are not only encouraging evidence that everyone can do something immediately, but they also provide us with a picture of what a transformation from the "bottom up" would look like. If enough people understood what issues are at stake, it would be possible to change our money system without state support. The models we are about to discuss differ in function savings and loans on the one side, and exchange of goods and services on the other as well as in their scope from local to nation-wide. - At a local level, the Canadian LET System offers an interest free means of exchange for groups, communities, villages or suburbs with a minimum of 20 and a maximum of 5,000 members. - The Swiss WIR-Wirtschaftsring (Economic Cooperative) shows how a practically interest-free accounting system for the exchange of goods and services can bring significant advantages to small and middle sized firms. - The Danish and Swedish JAK systems provide countrywide interest-free savings and loans schemes under conditions significantly better than those available from commercial banks. Taken together these models prove that an interest free money system which fulfils exactly the same functions as an interest based money system is practically possible. It proves that those who use it can benefit from such systems otherwise they would not continue to exist.
THE LET SYSTEM In every village, every city and every region there are people with abilities and resources which are not used in the established economic system, yet there is a demand for such abilities and resources. An exchange network which advertises through billboards, newspapers, data banks, radio, or other means, gives people the chance to share these skills with one another, and enrich the life of the community in the real sense of the word, without using the established money system. Of all exchange models LETS is the most widely used. There are hundreds of LET Systems in the U.S.A., Australia, Europe, New Zealand and many other countries. The first was established by Michael Linton in January, 1983, in Comox Valley, Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. In 1990 the organization had around 600 members with a yearly turnover of $325,000 "green" dollars. These green dollars are the unit of payment for LETS, and are equal in value to the normal Canadian dollar. Whatever a person may be prepared to pay for a task or piece of work is credited to the account of the one who performs the task and debited to the account of the person who buys the service. Interest is not 49