Re: Creditary Economics (CE)

[GGard97342@xxxxxx]

15 May 2001

To Bill Ryan,

I think you may be ignoring two points which might resolve the argument.

One, I am defining debt very broadly, and my approach is based on that
definition.

Two you are ignoring the fact that the owner of ANY store of value is such
because he has provided unrequited services to others in the community.
Morally he is therefore a creditor of the community.

The store of value might be trade goods, or absolutely anything he is not
going to consume himself. Gold bullion is almost useless to most people but
is compact, fairly portable, and almost indestructible, so it makes a popular
temporary store of value. As a means of exchange it is awkward. A coin is
handier and may therefore command a sufficient premium over bullion to make
it worthwhile to pay the cost of having it coined. But I doubt if many did,
because the first thing a holder of bullion needs to do is get rid of it fast
and replace it with something which earns a return. Recoinings were
instigated by the ruler as a way of making a fast buck. An additional factor
may have been the reluctance (detected in Babylonia in Hellenistic times) to
accept coins which did not bear the head of the current ruler.

All financial systems depend on conventions; I suggest that the convention
was, and is, that one accepts coins and notes as evidence of a moral right of
the holder to be regarded as a creditor.

But the same is true of the holder of a bank balance. Theoretically the bank
is the debtor, but how does a bank repay? In government notes which the
government has no intention of repaying? Your argument therefore applies to
every form of "money."

Geoffrey



In a message dated 15/05/01 05:13:41 GMT Daylight Time, bjm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
writes:

> William
>  Commodity money, e.g. gold and silver, is not a debt of another unit. They
>  are accepted as money due to general confidence in their value. But all
>  other types of money, e.g. fiat or credit, are a debt, ie. a promise to
pay
>  "money" on demand .
>  Geoffrey is correct for bank balances.
>  Basil