FUNNY MONEY: In Search of Alternative Cash - Softcover

Boyle, David

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0006530672 ISBN 13: 9780006530671

Publisher: Flamingo, 2000

Synopsis

Until recently, the growth of alternative cash had been the province of big business: phone cards, stamps, air miles and Tesco's clubcard points all have purchasing power, yet are not cash as we know it. Now, locally created money systems like "time dollars", "Womanshare" and "Ithaca hours" are being invented by communities for communities. Boyle tells the story of this extraordinary revolution: he travels to the USA to visit the people behind local money systems; relates their vision of the future; and describes how to set up your own currency.

About this title

Review:

‘An inspirational book, crammed with ideas’
TES

From the Author:

Only our limited idea of money is keeping us poor.
A revolution is going on in the world of money. The financial system is increasingly unreliable for ordinary people like us who depend on it, so people are finding ways of creating new kinds of money to underpin our lives - from time dollars or LETS to hours, the printed currency in upstate New York. These 'new alchemists' are in the forefront of a protestant revolution in money. Just like the protestants who did without priests as intermediaries, so they are discovering ways of creating money without banks. Funny Money is a journey through America to find these new alchemists who are showing us a way forward - and a personal investigation into the peculiar virtual nature of money at the end of the 20th century. The Times Educational Supplement says:"Part travelogue, part polemic, Funny Money is an inspirational book, crammed with ideas and crowded with eccentrics, the pioneers of alternatives to cash. After reading it, the Queen's head on Britain's bank notes looks somehow less impressive..."

About this edition

• Publisher: Flamingo
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0006530672
• ISBN 13: 9780006530671
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 252