Solar Dollars: A Complementary Currency that Incentivizes Renewable Energy

Incentives are the key to addressing climate change and the various other aspects of the current multi-dimensional mega-crisis. This paper proposes the issuance of private community currency vouchers by electric utility companies based on their willingness and ability to provide their customers with energy derived from renewable sources. By monetizing the value of renewable energy in the form of a community currency Solar Dollars help to solve several critical problems at once: They incentivize a more rapid shift to renewable energy, help communities to become more resilient and self-determined, and enable the decentralization of economic and political power.

ASEAN as an Optimal/Nonoptimal Currency Area

Economists have been arguing to this day about the benefits and risks of introducing a community currency. It is very difficult to clearly determine which side is right. Most often, scientists refer to the example of the so-called Eurozone, but it is still far from reaching an agreement between supporters and opponents of such a solution. This paper presents the issues of monetary integration in ASEAN+3 (i.e. ASEAN member countries, China, South Korea, and Japan) in terms of the optimal currency area and other necessary conditions for the creation of a sustainable development region. The researchers argue about whether ASEAN+3 should introduce a single currency. Some suggest that the group meets several OCA theory criteria, i.e. labour mobility and economic openness. According to the results of the study, ASEAN+3 is an economically diverse area and there is a lack of institutions enabling effective monetary integration in the short term. Optimization assumptions included in the analysis determine the real chances of development and survival within the currency area. The author's analysis has indicated that ASEAN+3 should not introduce a single currency for three reasons: failure to meet the optimization criteria, diversification of socio-economic development, lack of an institutional framework and inconsistency in the perception of monetary integration. On the other hand, it should be noted that a single currency could contribute to increasing the monetary security of the entire South-East Asian region, which means that the ​​monetary integration may be a long-term idea.

Sharing communities – Community currency in the sharing economy

For the further development and more efficient operation of the sharing economy, a fast and inexpensive peer-to-peer payment system is an essential element. The aim of this study is to outline a prototype that ensures the automation and decentralization of processes through smart contracts without blockchain technology. The model has been built based on the narrative that a community currency created through smart contracts can promote genuine practices of sharing as opposed to the profit-oriented approach that most of the currently operating sharing economy platforms have. Features of the model, such as ease of use, high-speed transactions without transaction cost are benefits that can provide a more efficient alternative to the traditional or to the cryptocurrency-based centralized sharing economy platforms.

The Worth of the ‘While’

Taxation always involves an element of value quantification, since to tax is also to implement a measuring scale—a process that is usually taken for granted. But when it becomes necessary to determine the taxational value of abstract time or labor, it is also necessary to outline the principles upon which such value is established. This article discusses the conflicting views of the Finnish Tax Administration and the Helsinki Timebank, a local exchange network, about how to tax ‘whiles’, the community currency that equates to one-hour stretches of work time. Based on a 2013 ruling by the Finnish tax authority and the Timebank’s responses to it, the article asks, to what degree can the choice of a particular ‘standard’ be taken as a ‘moral’ choice?

Convertible local currency and trust: ‘It’s Not You, It’s Me’ – A field experiment in the French Basque Country

We present a field experiment investigating the mechanism by which community currencies enhance trust. Our question is the following: do I trust more when using a community currency because I am a trusting-type person or because I think that you are trustworthy? We call the former preference-based trust; while the latter is belief-based trust. We apply a modification of the standard trust game from the experimental economics literature to disentangle these mechanisms. Player A has to choose whether or not to trust player B, and player B can either reciprocate that trust or not. Our innovation is in experimentally separating the currency in which the game is played ( effective currency), from the currency preferred by the participant ( preferred currency). If the mechanism is preference-based, then preferred currency will determine trust more than effective; if it is belief-based, then the effective currency will be determinant. We find strong evidence of the preference-based mechanism of community currencies on trust, and only weak evidence of the belief-based mechanism.