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        ID-8            Personal money.               November 26th, 1985






        Personal money.



        It seems generally to have escaped notice that money is 
        essentially a mere promise that value will be given.


        We are willing to trade in such promises when they derive from 
        governments, one of the least reliable of institutions.


        It makes equal or greater sense to base a money system on the 
        promise of the individuals who make up the community itself. 


        The promise suggested is not the promise to repay cash to the 
        community for goods received.


        We know that such promises are too dependent upon external 
        circumstances beyond anyone's control to be reliable.


        But a promise to make some time or goods available at some future 
        date is only jeopardised if the promiser is persistently 
        unwilling or dead, which comes to the same thing.


        If you could give your word, and thereby create a money that 
        would circulate in your community providing for the support of 
        many others, all the while remaining available for you to earn 
        back, providing, in that act, service for others as you yourself 
        were first served, why would you not do it ?


        "Who steals my purse steals trash, 
                  who steals my name.."


















        Landsman Community Services Ltd.              ID-8      Page    1