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 Here
in Ithaca, New York, we've begun to gain control of the social and
environmental effects of commerce by issuing over $110,000 of our own
local paper money, since 1991. Thousands of purchases and many new
friendships have been made with this cash, and several million dollars
value of local trading has been added to the Grassroots National
Product.
We
printed our own money because we watched Federal
dollars
come to town, shake a few hands, then leave to buy rainforest lumber
and fight wars. Ithaca's HOURS, by contrast, stay in our region to help
us hire each other. While dollars make us increasingly dependent on
transnational corporations and bankers, HOURS reinforce community
trading and expand commerce which is more accountable to our concerns
for ecology and social justice.
Here's how it works: the Ithaca HOUR is Ithaca's $10.00
bill,
because ten dollars per hour is the average of wages/salaries in
Tompkins County. These HOUR notes, in five denominations, buy plumbing,
carpentry, electrical work, roofing, nursing, chiropractic, child care,
car and bike repair, food, eyeglasses, firewood, gifts, and thousands
of other goods and services. Our credit union accepts them for mortgage
and loan fees. People pay rent with HOURS. The best restaurants in town
take them, as do movie theaters, bowling alleys, two large
locally-owned grocery stores, our local hospital, many garage sales, 55
farmer's market vendors, the Chamber of Commerce, and 300 other
businesses. Hundreds more have earned and spent HOURS who are not in
the HOUR Town directory.
Ithaca's new HOURly minimum wage lifts the lowest paid
up
without knocking down higher wages. For example, several of Ithaca's
organic farmers are paying the highest commmon farm labor wages in the
world: $10.00 of spending power per HOUR. These farmers benefit by the
HOUR's loyalty to local agriculture. On the other hand, dentists,
massage therapists and lawyers charging more than the $10.00 average
per hour are permitted to collect several HOURS hourly.
But we hear increasingly of professional services
provided for
our equitable wage.
Everyone who agrees to accept HOURS is paid two HOURS
($20.00)
for being listed in the HOURS directory. Every year they may apply
to be paid two additional HOURS, as reward for continuing
participation. This is how we gradually and carefully increase the per
capita supply of our money.
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Once
issued, anyone may earn and spend
HOURS, whether signed up or not, and hundreds have done so.
The
HOUR's thousand listings are a portrait of our
community's capability, bringing into the marketplace time and skills
not employed by the conventional market. Residents are proud of income
gained by doing work they enjoy. We encounter each other as fellow
Ithacans, rather than as winners and losers scrambling for dollars.
The
Success Stories of 300 participants published so far
testify to the acts of generosity and community that our system
prompts. We're making a community while making a living. As we do so,
we relieve the social desperation which has led to compulsive shopping
and wasted resources.
At the same time Ithaca's locally-owned stores, which
keep
more wealth local, make sales and get spending power they otherwise
would not have. And over $10,000 of local currency has been donated to
over 100 community organizations so far, by the elected HOUR board of
directors.
As we discover new ways to provide for each other, we
replace
dependence on imports. Yet our greater self-reliance, rather than
isolating Ithaca, gives us more potential to reach outward with
ecological export industry. We can capitalize new businesses with loans
of our own cash. HOUR loans are made without interest charges.
We regard Ithaca's HOURS as real money, backed by real
people, real time, real skills and tools. Dollars, by contrast, are
funny money, backed no longer by gold or silver but by less than
nothing- $8.4 trillion of national debt.
Ithaca's money honors local features we respect, like
native
flowers, powerful waterfalls, crafts, farms and our children. Our
commemorative HOUR is the first paper money in the U.S. to honor an
African-American.
Multi-colored HOURS, some printed on locally-made
watermarked
cattail (marsh reed) paper, or handmade hemp paper, some with
non-xeroxable thermal ink, all with serial numbers, are harder to
counterfeit than dollars.
Local currency is a lot of fun, and it's !egal. HOURS
are
taxable income when traded for professional goods or services.
 Local
currency is also lots of work and responsibility.
To
give other communities a boost, the book Hometown Money
is available.
It explains step-by-step start-up. and maintenance of an
HOURS
system, and includes forms, laws, articles, procedures, insights,
samples of Ithaca's HOURS, and issues of Ithaca Money. It's been sent
to over 2,000 communities in 50 states and beyond, and our example has
become international.
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