Be Your Own Money Making Machine

First, the disclaimer. We are not encouraging anyone to print counterfeit bills. Rather, a report by Susan Witt and Christopher Lindstrom of the E.F. Schumacher Society called

details the advantages of a region consuming goods produced in that same region using local resources and local labor. Ernest Fritz Schumacher's 1974 book Small is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered explains in compelling detail how to build vibrant regional economies and decrease reliance on global production systems. When Schumacher died in 1980, the E.F. Schumacher Society was formed with the aim of creating and promoting appropriate scaled economic tools that foster patterns of regional economic production and trade, benefiting small businesses and family farms, and involving consumers ever more directly with the people and land of their community. To these ends, and in light of a flagging national economy, there are numerous examples of regions creating their own currency with the aim of trading locally and keeping finance in their area. In 1991, Paul Glover took initiative in Ithaca, New York, and invented a local currency, called Hours, that could be traded for local goods and services. The denomination of the notes was hours of labor. To get things started, Hours were distributed to owners of small businesses who also agreed to accept the notes in return for goods and services. The program has been a minor success. There are now several new initiatives, including a local health insurance program. More recently, business owners in Detroit attempted to start a new currency, the Detroit Cheers, in 2009. Three Detroit businessmen – John Linardos from Motor City Brewing Works, Tim Tharp from Foran's Grand Trunk Pub and Jerry Belanger from the Park Bar – put up their own money to finance the currency. The big city equivalent of swapping grain for fish, the Detroit Cheers is still in its infancy. The scrip (new currency) concept was common during the great depression when people chose to exchange goods and services rather than worry about the fact that they had no money. It seems that the scrip is making a comeback though. So the solution is simple. If you are fed up with the decline of the dollar, invent your own money and see if you can do any better.