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Our [American] money system is structurally brittle. It doesn’t matter if you put a very clever guy or a stupid guy at the wheel.

Bernard Lietaer

Complementary currencies work in addition to existing money, rather than replacing existing, official money.
BERNARD LIETAER

Currency Different Purpose
Money is created through bank debt. When you go for a mortgage through a bank, they give you $100,000 to buy a house and basically send you out into the world to bring back $200,000 in the next twenty years. The first $100,000 is principal, and the second is interest.
BERNARD LIETAER

Bank Debt Giving House Interest Through Years
When the banks create the money, they don’t create the interest.
BERNARD LIETAER

Growth Population Zero
They send you into the world to compete with everybody else to get the second $100,000 that never was created and bring it back to them. So if we’re in a world with zero-growth population, goods, services, and money, the problem would be obvious.
BERNARD LIETAER

Everybody Growth Population Second World Zero
Look at any financial institution, at any bank. They’re all photocopies of each other. There’s no diversity of institutions and even less diversity of currency.
BERNARD LIETAER

Currency Diversity Ecosystems Looks Photocopies
The Future of Money: Creating New Wealth, Work, and a Wiser World
BERNARD LIETAER

Creating Wealth World
GREED AND COMPETITION ARE NOT THE RESULT OF IMMUTABLE HUMAN TEMPERMENT…
BERNARD LIETAER

Fighting Greed Order
Our [American] money system is structurally brittle. It doesn’t matter if you put a very clever guy or a stupid guy at the wheel.
BERNARD LIETAER

Clever Guy Structural Stupid
Therefore, just as you say its very logical that an ecosystem like this will collapse, it’s very predictable a monetary system like this will collapse, too. And it hasn’t finished collapsing, by the way.
BERNARD LIETAER

Collapse Ecosystem Finishing Predictable System Way
The clever guy will take a half hour to have an accident, and the stupid guy will take ten minutes.
BERNARD LIETAER

Clever Guy Hour Minute Stupid
A resilient, efficient system needs to be diverse and interconnected. On the other hand, diversity and interconnectivity decrease efficiency. Therefore, the key is an appropriate balance between efficiency and resilience.
BERNARD LIETAER

Appropriate Balance Efficient Interconnectivity Need System
The direct consequence is that we have to fight with each other in order to survive.
BERNARD LIETAER

Consequence Direct Fighting Order Survive
Basically, for any complex to be sustainable needs to have a balance between two factors: resilience and efficiency. These two factors can be calculated from the structure of the network that is involved in a complex system.
BERNARD LIETAER

Calculated Efficiency Factor Hands Involved Keys Two
Conventional money is supposed to be doing everything. By adding in complementary currencies, you actually get different types of things and different outcomes from different complementary currencies.
BERNARD LIETAER

Actually Currency Different Everything Outcomes Suppose
There are whole different families of complementary currencies. One of them is local currencies. One is regional currencies. Another is functional currencies. Another is social-purpose currencies.
BERNARD LIETAER

Another Complementary Currency Different Function Local Whole

Our [American] money system is structurally brittle. It doesn’t matter if you put a very clever guy or a stupid guy at the wheel.

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Our [American] money system is structurally brittle. It doesn’t matter if you put a very clever guy or a stupid guy at the wheel.

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