A recent TV News story about folks in Woodstock has me asking once again: “Where in blazes can I find critical thinking anymore?” It surely cannot be in the traditional media outlets any longer. No one knows which questions to ask, or understands true irony when they see it. Hypocrisy? I do believe its served best with peanut butter on whole wheat.
They [traditional media outlets] just don’t seem to understand when something is banging on their brain for proper attention. Such is the case as we look at the new form of “currency” now being hailed as a wonderful way to bring communities together by those we might discover are closely aligned with radical progressive causes. “Time Banking,” is being offered as a way for people to offer their skills, abilities, and expertise in trade for the services of others who have perhaps a different set to offer. From TimeBanks USA’s own site:
“Our mission is to expand a movement that
- develops, supports, and promotes a network of Time Banks that rebuild community, and
- reforms economic and social systems, policies and practices so that they empower human beings to contribute to the well-being of each other through reciprocity.”
And they have an abridged version of the above used as their tag line:
“Our Mission: Strengthening communities through reciprocity”
Here is how it works:
- You have a skill to offer, and you “give” an hour to someone in the time bank system
- You then get an hour of Time Bank credit
- You can use that time bank credit to “Buy” someone elses offering of time in THEIR area of expertise
In a way.. Its kinda like currency.. umm oh wait. It IS currency!
CURRENCY
–noun, plural -cies.
1. something that is used as a medium of exchange; money.
By definition time banking is a form of currency. But with one little carved out difference from that which we use to buy our groceries.. it is not taxed. Not taxed, but maybe just a little complicated.
In the real financial system, we use a standard (paper or coin) currency, to provide a means of transferring work done into work received. Its the nature of cash.. You earn $5, and you spend that $5 with someone who earns it by providing you with a service or product. The accumulation of a lot of little work can buy wondrous big things, and without the government taking too much of it, over a lifetime one can provide for years of survival.
But in the wonderful little utopia of the leftist mind, an hour of brain surgery is the same as an hour of baking cookies.
And in the progressive manner of handling such simple things as negotiating amongst agreeable parties, there is an entire procedural and convoluted process. But they have done away with some of the things that make standard (Cash) currencies difficult to deal with, by eliminating taxes, and regulating work rules.
Minimum wage cannot be enforced, and the taking of a persons effort by an unaccountable government cannot be done.. well.. maybe not yet.
Strange how the very effort to develop the time bank system seems to be because many folks cannot afford to pay cash for some services, and apparently some have skills that are good enough for time banking, but not good enough to market directly. What THEY are doing is cutting out the middle man, the government, that entity that shaves off what they cannot afford to give up, so they adopt a form of currency that is not taxed or controlled by government. How very clever.
The very things they flee in this manner, is that which they profess to support in the real world.
The fact one must earn a “minimum wage” if employed in the real world, minimizes opportunity for some with lower level work skills. It creates an environment where people with jobs to give, cannot fully afford those who might be optimal for those jobs. But not for the Time Bank. There being no mechanism to determine “worth,” it would be impossible to say that one person is not quite worth a minimum amount, as no value is assigned to any work beyond the time spent. In fact, the socialistic theory that your hour is as valuable as my own comes glaring forward in such a system.
And clearly the taxation of one’s labor, a decidedly “progressive” vision, cannot be accomplished where there is not a physical form of currency. Its hard for the sheriff to take the chickens if they are but mere figments of an overactive imagination. It shows that they “get it.” They understand that Taxing hurts the value of ones labor. So the time bank is set up to avoid such mundane things like income taxes. They “get it” and the fact that some folks efforts are not worth minimum wage.. which is why they promote their outside of the mainstream program that trades an hour for an hour.
But what they do not get.. is that all of what is in reality disliked in the cash for work system, should be a considered merely a creature of their (the progressives) kin.
What they do not get, is that they have not yet been looked upon by their very own monster left in the real world. An always hungry and ravenous beast which devours the best of intentions, eats the heartiest productions, and will soon have nothing to eat but time itself.
