Three problems, and how to solve them.
We now return
to the three major problems listed in the beginning and explain how this new
approach can solve them in one go.
1) Money and 2) Time. Money-time. Why not just put the two together? They’re closely
related. If you don’t make money, you can’t survive. To make money, you spend time working at some job. The time spent at the job takes away from
the time you can spend helping spread the word about RBE. In order to
transition to RBE, it’s going to take money.
Some plans cost more than others, and this is certainly on the low end of the
scale, but it still will require money nonetheless.
It’s even
more basic than that. Whenever you buy something, you’re really paying for
someone’s time. “Material Costs” are just time costs- the time it took for
someone to build the necessary materials. Of course, profit and subjective
demand fits in there too, but for the most part everything boils down to time.
We may not
have a lot of money, but we do have time. Since time is money, that’s all we
need. Even with a small group, we can trade meals and services amongst
ourselves to save and put the cash towards a monthly energy independence fund. Money
is just an abstract representation of value anyway, and anything can be money
so long as someone accepts it.
Which leads
us to…
Funding initial community transition efforts through Time Credits
Lower your
expectations. You will not be able to completely stop using money in one go. Our
goal is gradually lowering the amount of money we use in everyday life until we
simply don’t need it anymore. The most elegant solution I’ve found so far is time
credits. The idea is simple: One hour of community service equals one time
credit. You can then use these time credits to “buy” one hour of time from
someone else. Your credits can continually circulate through the community,
creating more value as they go along. For example, if you spend an hour growing
food for the group, you get a time credit someone else in the group will accept
to clean your house.
At the time
of writing (9/12/15), time credits are considered nontaxable by the IRS so long
as they are only used for services and not exchanged for goods. If you live
somewhere else, we encourage you to do research and consult legal counsel.
Through The
Global Assembly, we can “fund” transition efforts by giving away Time Credits and
creating a platform of exchange. One hour’s worth of work is always equal to
one hour- no exceptions. In later stages, we can pay essential workers
(doctors, farmers, policemen etc) a “bonus” hourly credit for each hour of work
to motivate them to join.
Printing your
own time credits is easy. Create a captivating design and aim to fit 10 to a
sheet of paper, while including a “learn more” link to your local assembly
facebook page on each one. If you can, add in a QR code for easy scanning. Educating
people and getting your time credits circulating is the hard part, and that’s
why you need to partner with other local organizations. This is where our brand
name can begin to work for us as our groups lean on each other.
- Have
your project manager create a “Council of Elders”. Bring together 12
respected people from around your city, perhaps church leaders/members,
nonprofit managers and business owners. Sell them the vision of an abundant,
self-sufficient city described in Ubuntu. This council will decide which
community projects get “funded” in time credits. Since our project manager
created the council and controls it, he/she can steer it towards sustainability
projects such as gardens, housing and education. The core ongoing projects
can’t change, but any number of additional community service initiatives can be
added. The project manager only stays as an official member until the council
can stand on its own two feet- then, to grant it more legitimacy the council
holds public elections to choose future members.
You don’t have
to build from scratch, and if you attempt to go it alone you will fail
miserably. Approach organizations who are already doing volunteer work and ask
them to start handing out community credits. To motivate people to work on community
projects, participating organizations should “charge” a small amount of credit
(15 or 30 minutes) for their services.
- Put that
business manager to work. Grow your network and get businesses involved by
convincing them to accept community credits. For tax reasons, only service-oriented
businesses will be eligible to participate, though any business can accept the
credits at their own risk. Give people places to spend their credits. School
performances, hair salons and barber shops, massage therapists, bowling alleys
and so on.
- Have
your social media manager create a local service exchange on reddit. The
service exchange functions as a way for people who have time credits to find
people willing to do projects.
3) Interest: How do you get other citizens to join?
Here again, it’s pretty simple. Appeal to peoples’ interest in saving money. Avoid
discussing a moneyless economy, the Federal Reserve, banks or environmental
catastrophe. There’s no need to get into hour-long debates. It’s so much easier when you just ask people
if they’d like to “ work less and have more.”
Simply print
up a bunch of Work Less, Have More flyers and distribute them within churches
and schools. Here’s an
example flyer, edit it as you see fit.
---
Originally
Written by Michael E.V Knight
Would you
like to..
Work less and have more?
If only you
had to work for just 20 hours a week to get everything you and your family need-
and instead of getting “paid” you receive FREE rent, utilities, food,
clothes, internet access, local transportation, haircuts/styling and other
salon offerings, massages, tool rentals, golf, basketball, swimming and just
about any sport you want to play, classes in anything you want to learn like cooking, programming, art or any
other skill our members know and want to share with each other.
If only you
could cut your cost of living by up to 50%-all while enjoying a higher quality
of life and more time doing what you want to do.
This isn’t a
get-rich-quick scheme, and you don’t have to move out to the country. We’re
just a rapidly-growing group of people who are ready to drop out of the rat
race and save money so we can spend more time with friends and family.
Sound good?
If so, please watch these videos for more info: goo.gl/2K2isA
After you watch
and like this video, you’re ready to get started. Please join us here to learn
more- It’s free! [insert your local global assembly facebook group]
Together,
We can all work less and have
more. Thank you.
Next Page: http://globalassembly.blogspot.com/2015/09/page-5-general-ideas-starter-projects.html
Previous Page: http://globalassembly.blogspot.com/2015/09/page-3-stages-of-transition.html
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