From: "John Zube" To: "Thomas H. Greco, Jr." References: <01f701c234f3$9f144c00$d650c043@v4dq1> <000701c24f3c$40a85180$553ecacb@e1d9k7> <008a01c252ae$24f63ea0$399db3d1@v4dq1> <000001c253fd$42f551c0$293ecacb@e1d9k7> <000301c254ed$e3b27160$719db3d1@v4dq1> Subject: 020906 Greco Global payment system using no national curency, a clearing exchange open to all, defining & publishing an objective concrete value standard and unit of account Date: Fri, 6 Sep 2002 21:54:55 +1000 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2600.0000 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2600.0000 Dear Thomas: an ambitious project. One clearing system and one value standard for all people and all transactions? Will something new have to be invented here? Or would a weight unit of silver or gold suffice? Many years ago a combination of some metals was mentioned in THE CONNECTION, that, it was asserted, preserved its purchasing power even better than gold or silver did. True or false? I do not know and this reference is presently buried somewhere. The adherents of hundreds of index currency standards each swear by their own. A wide-spread agreement on this subject has not yet been attained and I will not hold my breath waiting for it. Why assume that a computerized clearing system could cope only with a single standard? Why not choose e.g. the most popular 10 standards - all apart from national currencies with their statist manipulations? Against each other they would have a daily or even hourly fluctuating exchange rate - but via computer accountign that would not be impossible to manage and to publicize. But, I ask myself, do I, as normally not an importer or exporter, really need an world-wide acceptable clearing account and value standard? Isn't most of my income determined otherwise and most of my spending done locally? What good could it do to me? Would it help me to sell microfiche or CD-ROMs? Would it make much easier for me to buy books overseas? Rather than trying to convert all to one clearing system and one value standard, or one world currency, I would favor world-wide tolerance and peaceful coexistence for all of them - among their believers, with free market rating between them. Uniformity in payment avenues and value standards is not the highest possible ideal. Increasing the ability to pay and to clear and to soundly account values is. Nor need the rejection of national currencies by total and obligatory. For some years even the post WW II German DM was stable. During that time it could have been used internationally as a sound value standard. Then one could have changed over to another national currency standard - or a private one, that is more stable. If freedom in the choice of value standards is proclaimed as an ideal, it would lead to a free competion among them and to the recording of how stable or unstable all of them have been, over, let us say, the last 12 months. Then the best performers would be more widely chosen - but always still compared with runners up and with each other. If that process is long enough continued then it might turn out that a gold weight unit, for accounting and clearing only, would be the least evil or the one with the greatest advantages. None of them would be absolutely stable and objective and quite concrete. E.g., the jewellry preference for gold might go up or down, somewhat influencing the value of a weight unit of gold. Or, on top of its usage e.g. in computers another large industrial use might suddently be found for gold, one that would increase its value. Alternatively, some new substitutes for the industrial use of gold might be found or a cheap way to extract it from ocean waters or gain it from asteroids. The methods to achieve on KWH are still so different and so different in costs, that in the near future even this unit is not likely to be a stable one, not even for all hours of the day and for all of freely competing local electricity suppliers. Why apply central banking thinking and practices in this sphere, world-wide, without absolute necessity and great advantages for it? A privately run world-banking and clearing system or world-wide value standard system would not necessarily be the objectively best one or the best one for all kinds of people. Who is to be the judge? A private world currency board? And how concrete can any value standard be - under the subjective value theory, which has not yet been refuted and never may be? Is the attempt any more promising than the attempt to establish, world-wide, one sound way of living, one living standard, one health standard, one diet, one form of exercise or sport, one fashion, one form of music or literature, one school of painting, one religion, one philosophy, one school of psychology, one type of accommodation, one type of interior decoration, one type of garden, one type of clothing or shoes, one economic, political or social system for all, one panacea, one utopia for all, one ideal for all? Would you suggest a standard private library for all people as well? The world, all people, need only as much uniformity as they do really want. What they do really need and want much more is as much diversity as they and their groups do prefer for themselves, in all spheres. A uniform exchange or clearing medium or value standard is no more necessary than a uniformed people. Free trade is quite possible without a uniform currency, value standard and clearing avenue. Milhaud and Beckerath have written much on international clearing. Whether this is done via paper certificates, book accounts, international bank notes or via electronic accounts matters little. Essential and rightful is merely freedom, in that sphere as well. You might also remember the Conrad Hopman system, of one combined computerized utopia for everything. It is still only the ideal of a tiny fragment of the world population. How many world-wide computerized trading systems to already exist? E.g., "E-BAY". I believe that they do manage without a uniform exchange medium, clearing system and value standard. To each his own! Even in this sphere. Admittedly, some standards will become more or less world-wide accepted, among most people, but, almost certainly, not among all people or very soon in our time, even when we do try to work systematically towards that aim. My main aim is monetary and financial freedom and full political, social and economic freedom in general, which requires full experimental freedom in this sphere and this requires individual secessionism, voluntary associationism and full exterritorial autonomy. Moreover, is a new kind of computerized payment system really the ideal in a time when compulsory taxation and government subsitized code-breaking are still the norm? Why make the job easier for the tribute gatherers? In a world of hundred-thousands of different jobs and services and millions of different products, what is a relatively stable standard for some or many of them is not necessarily the best standard for all of them. And even the standard subscribed to by a vast majority might not be the best one for various minority groups of producers and exchangers. Why not anticipate that they would prefer to choose and use a different standard, more adapted to their conditions and their role in the world economy? We do not absolutely need a perfect value standard - but just one that is good enough for our purposes, combined with the freedom to adopt another one if it is found or can be developed, that is even better. How much of our productive and service or information capacity can do we need to supply world-wide, for a world-wide exchange medium, through a world-wide clearing and a world-wide uniform value standard? I recently wanted to convey US $ 330 to Laissez Faire Books for a book order. Doing this electronically, through a large Australian Bank, Westpac, would have cost me about A $ 50. So I rather took the risk and mailed it this amount. That cost me only an envelope and A $ 1.50 in a postage stamp. Arrival and credit to that amount was confirmed. But I have not yet got around to specify the book order. The modern, scientific and high technology way is not always the most economical one. It can also be time consuming. I am still waiting for a private electronic refund of taxes that became due to an income that I did not receive at all but that was received, with my consent, by Uwe Timm, of the German Mackay society, out of royalties for writings of John Henry Mackay. The formalities involved can require not only days but weeks. The tax requirements and papers involved might even take months. PIOT, John ========================================================================= ----- Original Message ----- From: "Thomas H. Greco, Jr." To: "John Zube" Sent: Thursday, September 05, 2002 3:27 PM Subject: Re: 020904 Greco, No. 2 of a batch of 7 > John, > This is my global agenda. > > Dee Hock, CEO emeritus of VISA International, in his book, "Birth of the > Chaordic Age," laments the fact that merchants and cardholders were not also > allowed membership, only the issuing banks. > I would like to remedy that defect by establishing a network of > credit-clearing exchanges with membership open to all. This would be a > global payment system using NO NATIONAL CURRENCY. > > I also want to define and publish an objective, concrete value standard and > unit of account. > > I see both of these as quite feasible if we can assemble the right team. I'm > now making connections with some successful entrepreneurs who might be able > to fill the gaps in the needed knowledge, skills and venture capital. > Tom >