A World Without Currency

[Dark Knifer]

Given how people function in today, I seriously don't see this working. What would the incentive for being, say, a medical doctor be if there was no benefit and all work. Currency definitely has it's ups and downs but humans ultimately need some kind of reward for actions and currency appeals to pretty much everywhere. Sure, some people can be saints and help other people because they can but this way everyone wants to do something. I know about poverty and all that but I don't see society functioning without currency sadly.

 

[SilentCom]

It's called communism. And I'm sad to say it doesn't work.

I was gonna say a world without currency is communism but looks like someone already beat me to it =(

Also, a world without currency will instead focus on goods being taken on the need basis. People would only take what they need. This type of idea is based on the notion of utopia, which needless to say, does not exist therefore currency is a necessity in our day and age. If it was several thousand years ago when people lived in small tribes and commerce did not exist, then it is likely that currency was not used.

 

[emeraldrafael]

It would run on a barter system, and eventaully would evolve back into currency once someone found something that was nice and pretty and new people wanted it.

So it wouldnt last long, and many people would die (at least if you just did it out of he blue today). Though Africa could probably do rather well financially.

 

[Saelune]

Depends. Is the world SUDDENLY without currency, never HAD it, or evolved to it?
If the first...war
The second, then bartering probably would have been used, thus there would be alot of things, which would replace currency, or services. This would hinder the development of big buisness most likely.

Robots. Money keeps the crappy jobs filled. Without money, we better have automated workers to do it. This would require a true communism to work best, with mandatory robotics engineering as the main focus of education.

 

[sleeky01]

Wouldn't it really just be Communism?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communism

 

[DaJoW]

Science and technology would most likely die. Kinda hard to barter with a paper on a slightly modified model of the universe.

Communism, as Marx wrote it, has a lot of pre-reqs before a system without currency would work I believe. I don't think cavemen fit very well into communism.

 

[Phlakes]

Yep, it's called communism, and it won't work because of one, extremely important, extremely powerful rule-

People are douches.

 

[Zaik]

The barter system.

You can call it whatever you like, any world without currency runs on some form of barter system.

 

[infohippie]

We'd probably barter for goods and services, but this would have problems in that two people would not be likely to need each other's services at the same time, so some kind of written IOU system would have to be introduced. This could easily be abused through fraud and forgery though, so printing these IOUs would have to be done by government only, and they would need to use special inks and paper to prevent forgery. Then people could trade these IOUs with each other without even having to end up performing a service in turn. We could call this a special name, maybe something like "finance".

 

[Asuka Soryu]

A World Without Currency: Requirements

World Peace

"Religion, ideology, resources, land, spite, love or just because... No matter how pathetic the reason, it's enough to start war. War will never cease to exist... reasons can be thought up after the fact... Human nature pursues strife."


Yeah. We're not gone to get rid of war, just by ditching money.

:/

 

[Paksenarrion]

A World Without Currency: Requirements

World Peace

"Religion, ideology, resources, land, spite, love or just because... No matter how pathetic the reason, it's enough to start war. War will never cease to exist... reasons can be thought up after the fact... Human nature pursues strife."


Yeah. We're not gone to get rid of war, just by ditching money.

:/

Actually, I believe what I was trying to say was that we'll never get rid of war, so we can't ever ditch money.

A World Without Currency: Requirements

World Peace
Unlimited Renewable Energy
Matter Teleportation Technology
Nanotechnology
Faster Than Light Travel
Colonies on other worlds

Bold for impossible, underlined for improbable, italics for world ending.

I agree with this analysis. Getting rid of money would be improbable, impossible, and/or world ending.

 

[Devil's Due]

Currency is pretty much the only reason math teachers bother trying to teach kids these days about math, since most don't bother with any job requiring numbers other than with currency. So to take away currency, you'd have a massive suicide increase of math teachers in the world, plus more students who end up slacking off in life doing only hard labor for food. Who would work at factories and such? Why work for an hour to get an apple when you could just steal parts off the factory belt every few seconds and trade off for later?

I mean honestly, taking away currency would cause chaos. We'd all love to believe it'd be like Star Trek. Hell, I'd love that. It would be so much better. But we all know a world without currency wouldn't flourish like Star Trek did. It just wouldn't. Shame, really.

 

[Sejs Cube]

Not Post-scarcity: world would operate on barter and contract servitude. Basically a currency substitute and feudalism. Not the greatest thing, frankly.

Post-scarcity: think Star Trek. Economics begins to break down as supply approaches infinity. Chocolate and blowjobs for everyone.

 

[Ocoton]

And not a single mention of Zeitgeist. You disappoint me, escapist.

 

[KarlMonster]

- sniperoo -

Cons
-it's hard to determine if a pair of pants=food
-agreeing to mow someones lawn for a month is a pain in the ass when their lawn is the size of a soccer field and you discover that the T.V wasn't worth it.

This is a good example why a currency of some sort is needed. Without a commonly accepted, fungible media, fixing valuation would be difficult. More to the point, corporations would assert that their products (made with horrible quality control) are worth more than they were allegedly worth before. What if the TV wasn't worth it, do you do a crappy job mowing the lawn, just in case?

For a really funny example, see Monty Python's Book-of-the-Month Club/dung/dead indian sketch.

[A dead indian comes as a bonus for purchasing a specific oven (trust me, its in the fine print). Wot? the indian's not dead? Uh-oh, it must be a faulty oven!]

Capcha is tired of Yahtzee's needling at stupid action-game hero names and suggests an exotic name that can't fail to be original: Guers Venataf

 

[EscapistUser123456]

If the world didn't had any currentcy, they would make formed bronze or gold and give them value, just like money.

 

[loc978]

I like the idea in that it would force people to be more self-sufficient (hard to pay for a house with chickens, better build it yourself), but we wouldn't have most of the technology that makes our lives so easy nowadays... not sure if that's good or bad.

 

[Wolfenbarg]

You can't do away with currency, because currency is EVERYTHING. That might seem a little shallow, but think of it like this. What is money these days? It's just paper. Paper that is traded on the global market to determine its value. However, it is an exchange that everyone in the world uses to buy everything they need. It doesn't matter if it is seashells, dog feces, or dollar bills, currency is just what we agree has value and agree to exchange to modify a bartering system.

Basically, there can not be an advanced culture without currency. If it isn't something physical, it would be something else. Time perhaps, working hours, good will, reputation. It's not a bad thing that the entire Earth's value can be given a dollar amount. It can also be given an amount of worth in clams and moon rocks.

 

[shiny_elmo]

It's called the venus project.

 

[iblis666]

without an extreme change in human nature there really isnt any way to have a world without currency besides a barter culture that isnt totally unstable. Now there are ways to stabilize a socialist non monetary culture but that would entail creating a system that acts like cash in this case we will call it credit.

Now for starters in this socialist society everyone would be entitled to the basics such as bland but healthy food, small spartan housing, good education, basic transportation, basic entertainment, and basic health care. Now if a person works they will receive credit and experience points.

Credit will behave much like currency so that they may buy items such as better food, better entertainment, or a great deal of other stuff. Experience points will let a person level up and as they level they will be able to get talent points to place in a talent tree that will let them upgrade certain things such as they can put a point in housing to let them have a bigger more comfortable house or have better health care.

You may be wondering at this point what is the incentive to become a doctor or some other stressful job and that is simple you will earn credit and exp faster as a doctor then a waiter.