https://www.xing.com/profile/Jost_Reinert/ did send me something very NICE. NEWS about one BIG item of 'demand driven economy' within the biggest part of our
Group (german threads) for which we had build a SPECIAL ...
"Regional Currencies in Germany"
https://www.xing.com/app/forum?op=showforum&id=41553A List of all known so called REGIOs
https://www.xing.com/app/forum?op=showarticles&id=266840...U.K.'s TELEGRAPH wrote:
There will soon be 65 regional currencies in operation alongside the EU's, but the financial authorities are not worried yet, writes Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
The Chiemgauer is one of 16 regional currencies that have sprung into existence across Germany and Austria since the launch of the euro five years ago.
www.chiemgauer.infoAnother 49 regios are in the pipeline. They are outside the control of the political authorities, mostly run by activists, farmers, eco-enthusiasts, anti-globalists, and citizen committees.
the MAP about regios
www.telegraph.co.uk/money/graphics/2007/01/18/cngerm18.gifThe phenomenon, not seen since the Great Depression, has left experts scratching heads at the Bundesbank. The mighty reserve bank, which issues euro notes and coins worth €146bn for a third of the eurozone economy, is relaxed about the risk of monetary anarchy. But it is sufficiently puzzled to publish a 63-page report probing the eruption of this movement.
Entitled "Regional Currencies in Germany, Local Competition for the Euro?", it concludes that the tiny scale of this bizarre Schwundgeld - scrip, or specie - poses no threat to the orderly management of the euro system.
Rather, the movement is a rejection of "capitalist globalism", pushed by idealists fighting to save regional cultures. The currencies are "luxury" scrip that flourish most in areas with the lowest unemployment. They offer users a "prestige gain" in their neighbourhoods, and a glow of good feeling.
School teacher Christian Gelleri launched the Chiemgauer, with the help of pupils, as an experiment in January 2003 at a rate of 1:1 against the euro.
Four years later, it spans two districts and is accepted by 550 shops, firms, and companies, including eight supermarkets and four co-operative banks. It has 40 issuing offices, and usage is expanding by 70pc a year. Monthly turnover is still a miniscule €135,000 (£88,000) - or rather C135,000.
The idea stems from the century-old writings of Silvio Gesell, a German economist who believed that interest and rent charged on capital is pernicious. He argued that usury aggravated economic downturns because the wealthy began to horde cash.
Austria's Tyrolean community of Wörgl launched a scheme based on his theories, in 1932, reputed to have slashed unemployment at the height of the Depression. It was watched by Keynes and Irving Fisher, who saw a fast-depreciating currency as a possible answer to the 1930s "liquidity trap".
"I came to the idea by studying Keynes and Fisher, but for us it is more a way to build regional strength. We're not enemies of Europe," said Mr Gelleri.
The Wörgl experiment was declared illegal by Austria's central bank when a further 200 other communities launched copycat currencies, threatening the authority of the state. Though article 35 of the Bundesbank's founding law forbids the circulation of "quasi-currencies", the experiments are being treated as a harmless eccentricity.
HOWEVER, THEY ARE A REMARKABLE EXPRESSION OF PEOPLE POWER,
AND A SUBTLE THREAT TO THE ESTABLISHED ORDER.
resource: TELEGRAPH.co.uk
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/...MOD-EDIT: shifted to "MONEY right to have"
This article was modified on 19 Feb 2007 at 04:07 pm.
