BerkShares
en.wikipedia.org
BerkShares
1–10 of 92 posts
Re: BerkShares
#2While not exactly an economist / finance type I would have thought the federal and state governments would have shut this down as it removes a certain level of currency control no?
Can anyone explain the legalities around this?
Re: BerkShares
#3Grew up in a town that used these (a town in berkshire county, ma); I thought they were a novelty and didn't really buy or use any (or see anyone use them). Just a single datapoint.
Re: BerkShares
#4It reminds me of the https://bristolpound.org/
Re: BerkShares
#5Ithaca, NY has (had?) a similar system: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ithaca_Hours
Re: BerkShares
#6While not exactly an economist / finance type I would have thought the federal and state governments would have shut this down as it removes a certain level of currency control no? Can anyone explain the legalities around this?
It's pegged to the dollar.
Re: BerkShares
#7It reminds me of the https://bristolpound.org/
Re: BerkShares
#8While not exactly an economist / finance type I would have thought the federal and state governments would have shut this down as it removes a certain level of currency control no? Can anyone explain the legalities around this?
The funny money here is stilled pegged to the US dollar, so the Fed can still exercise monetary control over it. It's really just a form of gift certificate (or scrip) from my reading of it. Anyways, there's a history of using non-USD money in the US: see company towns that only dealt in company scrip, Disney Dollars, etc.
No matter what you're making money in, the government expects to be paid, and it only accepts US dollars.
Re: BerkShares
#9While not exactly an economist / finance type I would have thought the federal and state governments would have shut this down as it removes a certain level of currency control no? Can anyone explain the legalities around this?
It's pegged to the dollar.
For the moment, the wikipedia article talks about plans to not have this be the case.
> but Nick Kacher of the Schumacher Center has discussed the possibility of pegging its value to a basket of local goods in order to insulate the local economy against volatility in the US economy.[6]
What then?
Re: BerkShares
#10There seem to be a lot of these "community currencies" in circulation throughout the United States. I wonder how much economic activity actually takes place using them, though. Millions of dollars? Billions?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_community_currencies_i...
Meanwhile, up north, there's Canadian Tire Money.