Ideas for the post-corona era: basic income
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We should already start thinking about whether we should implement changes in social events in order to prevent or better cope with a future crisis such as that of the current corona, or another crisis. I advocate for a basic income for everyone around the world. It is the most efficient, cheapest and most civilized way to fight poverty.
A crisis
Crisis is originally a medical term. It meant 'decisive turning point', the disease is at its peak, the patient dies or recovers. Crisis can be local, national or global. They come in shapes and sizes. But every crisis forces us to think about the cause, possible prevention and the possibilities of recovery. Every crisis is an opportunity to improve well-being. An opportunity not to be missed.
An extremely unscientific survey among friends, family, acquaintances and the media tells me that for the most part the corona crisis has reinforced the old ideas. I came across few new ideas. That also applies to me, by the way.
Corona has caused many deaths and chronic illnesses. The strict measures have also led to an unprecedented global economic downturn. This economic damage also leads to misery, illness and death. How could this last damage have been prevented? And that also applies to smaller and more local disasters such as earthquakes, floods, wars, etc.
I believe one basic income for everyone, everywhere is an effective means of combating much post-disaster misery. And it also has many other benefits.
The basic income
Basic income is a government-guaranteed monthly income for all adults with no conditions or controls. It is an inalienable right, like education and health care.
Here I write about the principle, the pros and cons, rather than go into the details of it, and any necessary further changes in salaries, taxes, benefits and subsidies to make it happen.
It was Thomas More who, in early 16e century already argued for a basic income in his book Utopia. A number of thinkers afterwards also pointed to the usefulness of a basic income. Under Richard Nixon, a bill was passed in the House of Representatives to guarantee a basic income (an amount of $10.000 by today's standards). It was voted on in the Senate because the Democrats thought the amount was too low. A basic income in an idea of the right and the left.
It's a proven good idea
In recent decades, a number of experiments have been carried out with a basic income for a group of people. These took place in areas as diverse as Mexico, Brazil, South Africa, India, Canada and London. They showed that the results were favourable, and there were virtually no unfavorable reports.
In Dauphin, Canada, there was a basic income experiment between 1974 and 1979. Virtually everyone continued to work, with the exception of some mothers with very young children and some adolescents. There was less inequality, less poverty, low child mortality, less health costs and crime, better school results and more economic growth. A very positive image.
In 2009, a group of 13 homeless people in London were each given £3.000 to spend freely. After a year, the results were reviewed. Expectations were not high.
It turned out that 7 of the 13 now had housing (and more who had applied), three were taking a course (cooking, gardening), some now had a telephone or a passport, many were reuniting with their children, and most had money left over after that year.
I will mention a number of possible advantages. No more high student debt. Students can take some time off, do volunteer work or take another course. Everyone can more easily resign from a boring job without really serious adverse consequences. Many controlling authorities can be abolished.
I also think that stress and depression as a result of poverty will decrease with many additional health benefits.
You can probably think of more.
I am convinced that poverty is not due to laziness, stupidity or a wrong pattern of behavior. Poverty is a lack of money, period. All over the world it appears that if poor people receive extra money, they mainly invest it in things such as education and work.
The arguments against free money for everyone
Too expensive
Calculations show that it is affordable provided there are adjustments in salaries, taxes, benefits and subsidies. In addition, certain costs in the community are reduced, such as for crime and health care. People are better educated and more productive. And…..poverty is really expensive., probably more expensive..more disease and crime.
People stop working
Well, take a look at yourself. Would you ever have stopped working if you had received a basic income? I do not think so. I think it is more likely that you will see the basic income as a nice addition to your salary. I wouldn't want to have that very small minority that does sit at home doing nothing as a colleague.
Too utopian
Well, everything we have now achieved: the abolition of slavery, more equality for men and women and more say in a democracy, to name but a few, was once a utopia. Impossible to reach, they said in the past. The idea of a basic income for everyone is also possible.
Thailand
Is something like this possible in Thailand? Yes, that's possible. I've never done calculations on that. Thailand is an upper middle income country. Only 20% of the gross national product now goes to the state. That can be increased to 30-35% without too many problems. (Three guesses how that is possible). In addition, certain cuts will then be possible in benefits for the elderly, the disabled, conscripts and students, the judiciary and health care will probably cost less.
In that scenario, every adult Thai (or resident of Thailand?) can receive a free contribution of 2500-3000 baht per month, and maybe something for the kids. No one will then be below the poverty line, no one will fall into a hole and many more people will be able to build a better life.
Today it is the historian Rutger Bregman who is committed to a basic income on many stages. See the links below for this.
Rutger Bregman, Free money for everyone, how utopian ideas change the world, De Correspondent BV, 2014. This book has been translated into 30 languages with a total circulation of 250.000 A review of the above book: hetnieuwe.viceversaonline.nl/
A TED talk by Rutger Bregman: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydKcaIE6O1k
And another one, in Maastricht: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIL_Y9g7Tg0
An interview with Rutger Bregman by Trevor Noah: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QbTWxFwuQtM
A history of basic income ideas: https://basicincome.org/basic-income/history/
A very long but good story about the basic income experiment in Dauphin, Canada, 1974-1979: www.vice.com/
In itself a socially desirable idea, but unfeasible because it is too expensive and removes the incentive to work. The idea of a basic income is especially popular with left-wing voters. Other political movements see nothing in it. In my view it also resembles the outdated communist idea of the realization of a classless and socialist society. That idea has completely failed, with Cuba being a good example.
The biggest problem with basic income is that it only works in an ideal world and that doesn't exist. The system is very sensitive to abuse and fraud. For example, it is very attractive to do odd jobs with a basic income. A lot of control will be needed, so more bureaucracy and officials (a major problem in many socialist states). It will have an attractive effect on migrant workers.
Another problem is that people who do not need it financially also receive a basic income. A billionaire like John de Mol also receives this benefit.
Another side note: the financing, the government would have to introduce sky-high taxes to finance a basic income. Many people would therefore no longer want to work because it hardly pays. You can already see this problem among low-skilled people on benefits. If they start working 40 hours, they gain 100 euros per month, so they stay at home.
The Central Planning Bureau (CPB) calculated how high the tax should be to finance a basic income of about 700 euros per month, whereby benefits are adjusted in such a way that benefit recipients do not benefit or deteriorate compared to now. The result: workers have to hand over 56,6 cents of every euro earned to the tax authorities. If the basic income is even higher, income tax will quickly become unaffordable.
With a tax rate of 56,6 percent, the incentive to work (more) is very low, especially for women in families with young children. As a result, people put work on the back burner. This in turn leads to taxes for those who do continue to work rising rapidly and the rate is much higher than 56,6 percent.
Read this article: https://www.elsevierweekblad.nl/economie/article/2015/06/basisinkomen-simpel-elegant-en-heel-dom-en-heel-duur-1770494W/
Lost the incentive of work? You, me and the vast majority of people want something more than a roof over your head and food on the table. Want to go out for dinner, on vacation, buy a tablet, etc. Then you really have to get to work.
You mainly still work for the tax. read https://www.elsevierweekblad.nl/economie/article/2015/06/basisinkomen-simpel-elegant-en-heel-dom-en-heel-duur-1770494W/ it has all been calculated once, with the conclusion: unfeasible.
So you don't need a holiday to Thailand and other luxuries? Will you sit on the couch at home? I do not think so. Even if the tax authorities take a little more than half of your salary, there is no reason to sit on the couch at home all day. They don't do it in Sweden and so on, there are several countries with a tax burden of over 50%.
It is obvious that people will work less, according to Elsevier 5% less. Well well. I think at Elsevier they were shocked, thinking 'basic income is free money! '. Those authors will probably also be against the bail-outs and subsidies to the business community, which is also 'free money'. But I do understand that first reaction, because that's what I thought when I first heard about basic income, but after reading a bit more here and there I've changed my mind.
https://www.businessinsider.nl/10-landen-waar-de-fiscus-een-flinke-hap-neemt-uit-je-salaris-en-10-landen-waar-je-netto-veel-overhoudt-hier-staat-nederland/
Hello Rob, we can discuss it until Saint Juttemis, a basic income will never come. Priceless, impracticable and there is no support for it (unless the whole of the Netherlands suddenly starts voting far left, but I don't expect that).
Peter,
Quote:
'The idea of a basic income is especially popular with left-wing voters. Other political movements see nothing in it.'
That is not true. The Forum for Democracy also advocates a kind of basic income at a recent (February) congress. See:
https://www.dvhn.nl/groningen/Forum-voor-Democratie-kijkt-naar-afschaffen-AOW-en-soort-basisinkomen-voor-iedereen-25355635.html
In the United States, a few right-wing economists who advocate basic income are like Milton Friedman. He just calls it a Negative Income Tax
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLt2X8Zybds
Hello Tino , in the Netherlands 38% is in favor of a basic income, so there is not enough support: The share of Dutch people who think the basic income is a good idea is about the same as 3,5 years ago: 38 percent (was 40 percent in 2016; no significant difference ).
https://www.binnenlandsbestuur.nl/bestuur-en-organisatie/kennispartners/i-o-research/basisinkomen-evenveel-voor-als-tegenstanders.10826535.lynkx
Can follow your reasoning well !
One more push and we're back to communism:
everyone is going to work together happily but meanwhile you a little more than me!
Probably, but for the same pay: the p.. up!
Dirk
No basic income for everyone. The incentive to stick your head out of the grass through work or entrepreneurship must be there and there are facilities for emergencies in our world and that is a good thing. There is also tax for that; it has to be paid for from somewhere. Tax rates are always arbitrary and we will never agree on that.
Well, everything we have now achieved: the abolition of slavery, more equality for men and women and more say in a democracy, to name but a few, was once a utopia.
That's not quite right. Many Thai, Laotians and other Asians are picked off the streets, kidnapped and end up on fishing boats under the most appalling conditions.
Many are murdered and rarely, if ever, see their relatives again.
https://www.2doc.nl/documentaires/series/2doc/2020/maart/Ghost-Fleet.html
Children who work for multinationals, pure slavery.
And what about all those boat people who come to Europe and the Netherlands, many without a decent education.
A basic income will therefore be spent on that.
Do you realize what kind of pull this has on the economy??!
At a certain point that is really not feasible.
Personally, I am in favor of a different approach to getting the unemployed or people who are limited by illness back to work.
The Swedish model is a good example of this, not perfect, but a lot more efficient than the Dutch model
https://www.digibron.nl/viewer/collectie/Digibron/id/7dda7edd179405c04ab263d59d63f287
Life is a struggle for existence.
In the long run, a basic income leads to a large group of people who become parasitic on society and complain about the level of their income and the violation of their rights – after all, the basic income is their right – without wanting to take the trouble to make an effort to to increase this income.
It leads to boredom and therefore crime.
Furthermore, such an income can also be spent incorrectly, for example on too many luxury products or stimulants, leaving too little money to live on.
The idea of a basic income is a nice one, but I think it works out wrong in practice.
Having said this, something has to change in the world.
The world is now in the hands of a few people, with the people with only a billion euros being regarded as pauper.
There will have to be a redistribution of wealth, as well as an adjustment of property rights in tangible things – land, for example, or houses and food.
Good social services will also have to be set up worldwide, but free money does not seem to me to be the best solution.
There must be an incentive to help build society.
dear Tino Kuis, your ideas are the best way to plunge the world into a pool of poverty. I believe that countries like Venezuela, North Korea, Cuba have long proven that these communist philosophies are going nowhere.
Essentially, a basic income already exists in the Netherlands. It's just called differently. Unemployment benefit, social benefit, rent subsidy, child benefit, etc. All this is paid by those who pay taxes and social security contributions. If this basic income is introduced for everyone, it will become even more expensive. Father, mother and 2 children over 18. So 4 times a basic income of about 700 euros. that way no one will work anymore.
Added to this is the refugee flow. Count out your profit.
And then there is a proposal from Thomas Piketty who wrote two thick books about inequality in society. He shows that societies with more equality function better in almost every respect.
In his latest book, he pleads for a gift of 120.000 euros to all 25-year-olds. And legacies of more than 500.000 euros are no longer allowed.
https://www.folia.nl/actueel/136357/piketty-op-de-uva-geef-iedere-25-jarige-120000-euro
Tino, I do agree with you that there should be a better distribution of wealth. How? That is difficult. But in the Netherlands we are still doing quite well.
I think it's best that you donate all your money to Thai unemployed now and see what comes of it. People like Piketty write wonderful books and become millionaires because of it. And then give them away? Look at the Democrats in the US: they have been in parliament for 30 or more years, with a salary of USD 150.000, but are all multimillionaires. How could that be. I don't think I need to elaborate much about Thai politicians.
People like you always want the other taxpayer to fund all of this. If you really believe in your own fairy tales, today you will give everything away to your poor neighbor. Let me know if you did that with your neighbor's phone number. Then we'll talk again.
Well, I actually only have debts now, which I will give to my neighbor.
Those 25 year olds spent it before they reached age on gadgets. It's more likely to increase the disparity between the smart savers and investors and the stupid, forgive me the word consumers. There are now also young people with huge consumer debts. Nice for the Bol.coms and other online stores.
Too much Dire Straits money for nothing and your chicks for free. After 35 years of working at the Social Affairs Department, I know that this will not work for many, the weakest. They will continue to need a lot of guidance, will count themselves rich and accumulate even more debts. I live in a deprived area in Amsterdam where people go to the food bank because they don't buy what they can afford. Five kilos of potatoes for 2 euros or 5 kilos of onions for 2,59 or a kilo of nectarines or two types of peaches for one euro… No, then it must be the things they have in mind. Next week they want nectarines for double that. Or a kilo bag of Israeli potatoes for 1.99 at AH. You cannot solve poor thinking with a basic income. The self-employed drs are no better off either.
An important argument for a basic income may lie in the fact that automation of labor will continue to be implemented. Much of the work done by current retirees no longer exists or has been significantly reduced. Agriculture and construction are also increasingly automated or prefabricated. In the future we will distribute the available work even more. We used to work 6 days a week. Now a working week of 4.5 days is already a full working week. Where does the profit go from all those automated workplaces? To the shareholders. However, it is the former employees who ensured that these automated companies could be continued with their work. In concrete terms: the secretaries and bank employees have ensured that the banks have been able to make their activities superfluous through digitalisation. Secretaries fired and banks' profits go to shareholders. This automation continues and it is the current (and former) employees who have earned it. Literal. In about 10 years there will be automated factories running everywhere. Robotization is developing rapidly. Then we have an even shorter working week of two days. We would then have to move towards a system where everyone receives a basic income from the automated factories and institutions. This basic income is collected through taxes and passed on to all people. We can already arrange that on the basis of the expected income. The article above perfectly describes the benefits of such a basic income. It is not too expensive as the money is generated through the automated work. In addition, there is an opportunity for people who want to (and there will be a lot of them) who want to earn some extra money with activities that are difficult or impossible to automate. These activities will largely lie in services, recreation and tourism, education and small-scale creative activities. That basic income system should be introduced worldwide through the contributions from the automated factories and other automated operations. Then there will be no more refugees who flee their country because of a lack of income and food because there is also a basic income there. The alternative is: Ever-increasing refugee flows of people who have no income while around them automated machines drag their raw materials away to countries that are getting richer. We will see that the world population is intensively connected. This corona crisis has made that clear. The alternative is to protect your own territory and defend it against the billions of people who have run out of food and go get it where it is still available.
I too would not stop working but accept the EXTRA (basic) income in gratitude. I wonder, of course, whether my tax payable would not increase proportionately and would therefore not benefit me at all. Money, unlike apples, does not grow on trees. Of course the EU/ECB can conjure up Fiat money for free. Of course, that never has to be repaid in any way.
In short, I don't believe in it.
I work for my own money, pay taxes, unfortunately also for matters with which I do not agree and when I retire, I will receive my pension and AOW, on which I have paid generously myself.
If someone feels called upon to provide income to complete strangers out of a social sense, they should not hesitate. I help people close to me without asking for a contribution from others.
The people I know (family, colleagues, friends, neighbours, acquaintances, …) have not become rich with (hard) work. Well-to-do at most, ie a house, car, paid-off house and some savings. The few wealthy people I know have seldom become so by their own initiative, but by much inheriting or donation among the living. My best friend in Pattaya has 9 million euros thrown into his lap. He inherited a large old (discontinued due to closure) shop for wallpaper, curtains, ... along a busy highway with Krefel, Brantano, etc. from his deceased parents. That large piece of land with an old building was next to the Aldi. A modern Lidl now stands on his sold land. The good man never worked in his life, not even in his parents' business. Was always maintained by his grandmother and his worthless inheritance turned out to be a goldmine.
There was something like that in this world quite a lot until about 30 years ago called communism or socialism and it has had almost 100 years to fail miserably all over the world.
I would consider a humane minimum wage from which everyone can actually pay for their basic necessities, and a high-quality education that is really accessible to everyone, sufficient.
Especially a good quality education, where people are offered the same competitive opportunity, to leave this minimal life behind, should be possible for everyone.
Only a basic wage without the aforementioned competitive opportunities for a better financial life would plunge many people who dream of a slightly better life, although they cannot actually finance it from their basic wage, into poverty again.
I really appreciate your hard work, Ronald. Tribute.
But I know a lot of people, especially in Thailand, who work very hard and are still poor. And I know rich people who hardly ever worked.
You get rich from investing, interest-on-interest, and not from working. A nice legacy can also help. That is also what Thomas Piketty showed.
See here:
Quote:
'In short: continuously working harder does not really make you rich in the long run. Making sure you get the most out of your money does.'
https://www.businessinsider.nl/van-alleen-maar-hard-werken-word-je-nooit-echt-rijk-zegt-een-befaamde-financieel-adviseur/
Dear Tino, as you yourself already knew, your submission has caused quite a stir. the times in which we live, many people have strong opinions based on what they themselves usually call common sense.
This morning I bought a piece of affordable fish in the supermarket and while I can see the Oosterschelde from my house, that piece of fish really comes all the way from Thailand this time. it is a given and my common sense says that things can and should be done differently.
Some matters may be investigated to see if things can be done differently.
I think I know, don't pin me down, that a test has been run 2 times in Canada, recently again. both times by a right-wing government. and both times to everyone's surprise successful. and the success arose from other considerations on the part of the recipients of that basic wage, if everyone with common sense had estimated it in advance.
I believe it is Switzerland where people recently voted to launch a broad basic income project there? and there were already many people for it, but not yet a sufficiently high percentage. the plan is to continue the discussion and to present it to the people again in a few years.
in the Netherlands a while ago, after a survey, I think 3% people were in favor and a very large part thought it was a stupid proposal. I believe that more recently 35% thought it was an idea to consider. Times change. and it seems to me, whether we see these days that indeed times change, for better or for worse. new times call for new ways of thinking.
The ancient Greeks believed that students should attend classes naked. our concept of school largely comes from them. The first ones who suggested that maybe something to wear were ridiculed at the time. In the end I had to get dressed every day to go to school.
I am not really familiar with it, but in the Netherlands today we live with a system where almost everyone with a job does not earn enough to pay for normal basic things. That goes for a lot of people. without their rent subsidy, child benefit, benefits, etc. etc. it is not possible. Raise taxes on the one hand and pay out that forest of subsidies and allowances on the other. And the tax authorities have been out of control for years. I think we should look for another solution for that. A basic income can be a variant of that. In any case, I have read both in reports and seen in two documentaries that, possibly to my surprise, many people actually became more active in the labor market, people suddenly experienced less unconscious shame, barriers, expectation..
in the Netherlands last year 2019, 1 million people suffered from a burnout or serious burnout-related complaints. Take away the small children and the very elderly. Then that is towards 1 in 12 people. In the age group of 18 to 65, 42,5% of the inhabitants were either on antidepressants and/or sleeping pills. Then it seems to me that something is wrong in this country and that it makes sense to look for how things can be done differently. And above all don't continue on the road we're on. That will possibly be left according to many excited responses I read? I would rather call it common sense.
there was a nice commercial once, I mean from Nike? showing people who had really changed our society for the better. DWDD made an item about it for a while. all those people turned out to be wayward thinkers, people who dared to explore new ideas. they were all divergent thinkers and in the Netherlands, among adults, we only count 2% divergent thinkers. People who know that things can be done differently, People who brought us to the moon, who discovered peneceline, who wanted to give women the right to vote, who realized that people with a different appearance are no less. People who ultimately make the difference. And in the beginning, 98% are convinced that those thinkers are doing stupid things. we have enough complainers and moaners. Long live the progressives!
Basic income is a laudable goal. You do not write about the level of the basic income and that is just a thing. It will not go higher than the level of assistance and probably the possible funding shows even a much lower level. This applies to a rich country like the Netherlands. For many other countries, basic income is an impossibility to finance. Nice in principle and first come up with a financial substantiation.
Moderator: Off topic.
In some cases, a basic income is a good idea, but there really isn't one economic system that can be used for everything.
You have to constantly fine-tune the economy, constantly pushing the buttons to make the most of developments.
It's funny to see that there are still people who firmly believe in the neo-liberalist system of Reagan and Thatcher, which was successful at the time, but not for everyone.
Like neo-liberalism, communism has failed miserably, there is no single system that is successful for a long time, constantly adjusting and fine-tuning so that everyone can benefit is best for everyone in the long run.
Give everyone in the world a basic income of roughly $800;
Nice idea, but…..
then everyone in Thailand will be well off without working;
then everyone in Belgium is poor without additional income;
then everyone in the USA is a “sucker” who cannot go to the dentist once.
Or does Tino want to look at each country separately as far as basic income is concerned. Oops, very frustrating for poor countries with this kind of communism.
Socialism makes everyone poorer.
And neo-liberalism kills everyone, even nature.
Personally, I do not see the connection between the introduction of (a form of) a basic income and the world after Corona. I don't think we should make this connection either. The idea of a basic income dates back much longer and has completely different backgrounds in countries where it has been introduced in part or in full (e.g. in Iran). See the overview in Wikipedia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income_around_the_world.
In the world after Corona, we must reflect on a new type of sustainable economy and the reduction of the gap between rich and poor, healthy and unhealthy (for people, animals and nature), the decrease in (paid) employment and the speed of changes. If we don't, we'll have to wait for the next crisis.
The perfect solution in an ideal world, but… no ideal people live in that world.
Professionally, I notice that many who (in Belgium) have a “basic income”, here it is called a living wage, that they only drink and use drugs, because with that income they have enough to live on with those stimulants alone.
The principle of basic income has already been tested in several places, and rejected again and again. People need an incentive to do more than vegetate.
If one were to abolish unemployment, sickness, holiday, training, career interruption, ... allowances as well as rent subsidies, child allowance, ...
If one were to tax inheritances and gifts at 100%…
In the Netherlands, the average working week is 30 hours (there are many part-time workers there). If you calculate that on the number of people of active age (many of whom do not work) you do not even arrive at 12 hours a week!
I mean: if one is only allowed to live on income from work, then you will get starvation on an unprecedented scale. Labor is scarce and many jobs are artificial, ie created on purpose to hide the unemployed, including civil service, social economy, service vouchers, culture, ... Without massive subsidies, those jobs do not exist or to a much lesser extent.
And labor will become even more scarce due to extensive automation, artificial intelligence, digitization, robotization, globalization, block-chain, ...
The latter ensures that 80% of all administrative actions disappear …
In different types of countries, the introduction of basic income will be introduced for different reasons, have different consequences and will have benefits in addition to costs.
In countries that can be characterized as a welfare state, the introduction will mainly result in savings in the government apparatus: no more civil servants for the already unjustified payments of AOW, WAO, other benefits, assistance, all kinds of personal subsidies, rent subsidies, childcare allowance, no more student finance department: all are no longer necessary.
In countries that are not a welfare state, it will mainly mean combating poverty and an allowance for everyone on a low income instead of introducing group-specific schemes such as pensions, benefits, subsidies on rice, income supplements in the event of disasters such as now with Corona, etc. .
This basic income also reduces labor costs. It is not the intention that people who work next to it receive the same salary as before the introduction, but a salary that is one basic income lower. Labor therefore becomes cheaper for employers, in addition to the abolition of taxes for specific social insurances, but a tax for everything.
There are thoughts to pay this basic income in the local currency (or give the citizen the choice of how, ie in which currency or ratio he/she wants to receive this basic income. There is a growth in so-called local payment instruments which have the advantage that they are not sensitive to exchange rate fluctuations. With a local currency you can pay in a certain region and not outside it, thus supporting the regional economy. Companies can also pay with this currency when purchasing IN the region, and even pay salaries. regional economy more immune to external influences. If the prices of goods and services do not go up, there is no need to increase the basic income. This is therefore very different from the so-called cryptocurrencies that can be traded worldwide (and actually mean nothing to the local economy).
https://centerforneweconomics.org/publications/local-currencies-in-the-21st-century-understanding-money-building-local-economies-renewing-community/
https://ideas.ted.com/why-your-city-should-have-its-own-currency/