• Onomatopoeia@lemmy.cafeEnglish
    5·
    19 hours ago

    And there will be another currency after that.

    Again, I’m not spending my time bartering the chickens my boss gave me for some crabs, for some iron, for some gas, just to trade that with the person that has the thing I need, because thats what they wanted.

    If you come up with any argument about “well my simplifies that by making the trades for you”, then you’ve just re-engineered currency.

    Currency isn’t the issue, it’s money lenders (you know, the table Jesus supposedly threw over at the synagogue), because it’s the generation of debt to make profit at the expense of others, while not contributing anything tangible, that’s the problem according to the parable.

    You could still have debtors in a barter system, and that would still be problematic. It would still be debtors preying on people with little to start with, like payday loan places. “We’ll loan you 2 chickens today, but you’ll owe us 3 on pay day”. See, no difference.

    Now if you want to make a local barter system just because, that’s different. But acting like you’re going to replace currency is naive, at best. Currency has been with mankind for thousands of years, because it simplifies trading.

      • TehPers@beehaw.orgEnglish
        3·
        16 hours ago

        This would still be true in a barter system.

        You give your bank 2 chickens. Your account now has 2 chickens. To save people the effort of transporting chickens, you give someone an IOU (bank note) equivalent to 2 chickens, and they do the same for your gas or whatever. Now you have a system of currency and a method of exchanging each currency (chickens, gas, cows, etc) for each other.

        Software is created on this system of currency, and defines conversion rates between each currency. Software defines the value of products relative to each other now.

          • TehPers@beehaw.orgEnglish
            2·
            14 hours ago

            Not really, no. Assuming that all currencies are going down the toilet and your software is supposed to sidestep it in some manner, then all you’re really introducing is basically an exchange for a new system of currencies. You end up in the same place in the theoretical future where barter is the main method of trading.

            On the other hand, if you’re doing this just for fun, then there’s nothing wrong with that, and introducing it that way might get you a better reception. But this is not the future of trade, just a niche tool that some might find useful, which is perfectly fine.