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How It Works
The kind of money we have now, physical object money, or POM for
short, is replaced by computerized accounts. The winner-take-all
model of market competition is replaced by an ingenious principle
-- you get paid for anything that produces a net benefit. Money
is added to your account when the benefit has occurred. So if you
help your neighbor move her sofa, you get paid when it's upstairs.
If you help build a bridge across a river, your pay begins when
the bridge opens, and you get periodic payments as long as it’s
in use. Of course building a bridge can take years. How do you
live until it's done? Necessities like plain-but-wholesome food,
a decent place to live, "standard" clothing, and medical
care are all free.
The neighbor whose sofa you moved, or the folks who drive across
the bridge, aren't the ones who pay you. There's an organization
of people called "payers," about 3-5% of the population,
who do all the paying. The payers are not part of the government.
They hold a position of power and respect, but becoming a payer
means giving up money and luxury goods. Payers lead lives of voluntary
simplicity using only those items defined as necessities, which
are all free. Note that the term “necessity” is flexible.
Perhaps basic cable TV would be considered a necessity, and the
premium channels a luxury. Even if it’s not a vow of poverty
exactly, the No Luxuries policy weeds out anyone thinking they
might get rich by soliciting bribes for unfairly large payments.
Any mentally competent adult may decide to become a payer, but
it tends to be a commitment people make later in life.
Small jobs like moving the sofa earn a one-time payment from a
single payer, but large payments require the participation of multiple
payers. Even if a payer were somehow bribed, he couldn't award
a very large unearned payment by himself.
What if something you've done turns out to be more beneficial
than originally estimated? Payers can give you more money later,
but they can never take money out of your account.
In fact, no one can take your money, because this kind of money
is non-transferable. It comes into existence when a payer adds
it to your account, and it ceases to exist when you spend it. Your
account decreases by the cost of the item, but that money just
vanishes, it isn't transferred to the seller. The seller gets paid
for facilitating the transaction, but that's new money created
by a payer for that purpose. The people who made the item, and
the ones who transported it to the store would also get some money
from a payer, but again, it's not "your" money they're
getting. All sales work this way, and every transaction is recorded
by a computer.
Money-related crimes become virtually impossible. A thug could demand your money, but there is literally no way for you to give
it to him, because money cannot move from one account to another.
He could steal a luxury item you bought, but the police can easily
look up the computer record that proves it's yours. There are no
crimes of desperation because everything a person really needs is already free. With no more banks, bank robbers are forced to
turn to a life of helpfulness, because that’s where the money
is.
If crime truly does not pay
in this system, neither would
polluting
the environment or producing unsafe consumer
goods. Payers are trained
to consider any secondary
effects and adjust pay downward
if those effects are harmful.
They have no incentive
to “look
the other way.”
The role of government is greatly reduced in the post-POM world.
Only an individual person
may own things or have an account, and
the government is not a person. Any functions still provided by
government are now paid for by the payers, the same as everything
else, so government doesn’t need its own budget. The same
principle applies to businesses that are currently structured as
corporations. Their assets become the property of individuals.
A word to the wealthy: Corporations may be disbanded, but you'll
be reimbursed for whatever your shares were worth. Also, you get
to keep your stuff -- the wine cellar, the Bentley, the chateau
in Vail -- they're all still yours. This is about creating an
economy that works for everyone, not about punishing the wealthy. If you're
rich now, you'll be just as rich in the post-POM world but you
won't have to pay taxes.
For the rest of us, work no longer consists of jobs as we think
of them now. You see something that needs doing, you do it, and
you get paid. Large enterprises are less hierarchical and more
like a band of colleagues.
You may be wondering where the money comes from for all those
free necessities. Essentially, the price of luxuries includes the
cost of infrastructure, and providing a lot of free stuff is part
of this society’s infrastructure. Since luxury prices are
fixed, the payer organization may need to make ongoing small adjustments
in pay to keep the money supply roughly equal to the total cost
of luxuries available for purchase. This keeps the economy in balance.
We all have a tendency to be skeptical of the unknown, but this
new economic system has a design advantage that all previous economies
were lacking. It's the first system structured so that people
can only prosper through acts that benefit society. It works with self-interest,
not in opposition to it, and that difference could transform the
world.
It would be a mistake to say that this could never happen. People
once scoffed at the idea that a society could function without
slaves, but slavery was abolished and life got better for everyone.
More recently, the former Soviet Union abandoned its long and regrettable
experiment with communism. Sweeping economic change is possible.
Today we see corporate capitalism in trouble around the world.
Trying to prop it up with bailouts
may help temporarily, but a
coordinated switch to this Pay For Net Benefit system would create
a much brighter future for
us all.
To learn more, please read
'Invisible Hand' (or listen
to it on mp3) and also,
read the articles on
this web site.
Then talk to your friends
and help us get the word
out! People need to know
this option exists.
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