#timebanks

Weeks, Forged Family, Aladdin, and Elisha?

    This is an update, for tonight’s holiday, my favorite, of studying overnight, with a link to the class I taught on it some years ago.  I forgot to mention that we read the Megillah of Ruth on this holiday, as well, with the famous story of Ruth and Naomi  becoming family, used by the Rabbis for the conversion process, and the idea of Na’aseh ve Nishmah by all of those who would ever accept…

Thoughtful Thursdays, Stayed on Freedom’s Call page 30, and mutual aid

It is crucial that we each help our society to become more fully inclusive for all of us today, and to come and work together, for all of us, right?   I have a short story to add, after this page quote, about my persona experience using Time Banks… I believe that attention to shared histories, as in DC, may provide part of an answer.  I started a note about that, a few years ago, in my book…

Thoughtful Thursdays, Stayed on Freedom’s Call page 29, and new spins on old solutions

It is crucial that we each help our society to become more fully inclusive for all of us today, and to come and work together, for all of us, right?   I believe that attention to shared histories, as in DC, may provide part of an answer.  I started a note about that, a few years ago, in my book Stayed on Freedom’s Call: ” … Time Banks USA“What is the function of a currency? Rewarding caring and…

Published: Comment Factory (27 April 2012)

Lori Hutchins, 30, from South Portland, Maine is self-employed and has fallen on harder times since the recession. Over the last couple of years, in order to obtain essential paid-for services such as healthcare, she has used Hours Exchange Portland.

Time banks such as these give credits, for the hours you spend working for the community – raking leaves or driving around the elderly for example – which can then be exchanged for services rather than paying cash.

“When the economy gets tough, things really change. I offer my events planning skills in exchange for healthcare. I could pay for insurance, but I would rather save that money for repairs on my house. With unemployment levels where they are, for some people even paying $20 per doctor’s visit is too much,” said Ms Hutchins.

Of Hours Exchange Portland’s 755 active members, 535 have joined since 2008 and nearly 60 per cent earn under $30,000 a year. Over three quarters of its members are women.

Orion Breen, a co-ordinator, said that while the idea of time banks started off as an initiative driven by the notion of reciprocity and about building a community through social capital, over the past few years for many it has become a means by which to save costs and receive necessary services – from mechanics and plumbers to doctors and babysitters.

Health, education and transportation were the time bank’s top service categories exchanged in 2011 by number of hours.

Ed Collom, associate professor of sociology at the University of Southern Maine said that against a backdrop of declining income and high unemployment, time banks or other localised exchange and trading systems (LETs) provide economic empowerment.

According to his research there are 128 time banks in the US with a total of 25,000 members, however there are many more grassroots efforts that are overlooked. Michael Bloomberg has strived to promote volunteerism throughout New York City as mayor and in addition to the one site existing in each of the five boroughs, there are plans to open 25 more within the next year.

“As society begins to develop their thinking about what’s wrong, it looks to what is right and that is a currency that honours the capacity of every human being to give, embody kind of values that this country ought to move towards,” Mr Collom said.

“Occupy Wall Street groups have approached time banks because of a desire to create a more equitable system of distribution and an economy that does not simply increase privilege and disparities,” he said.

Time banking had its intellectual genesis in the US in the early 1980s and in1995 Edgar Cahn founded TimeBanks USA and trademarked the concept.

“It sends a message that every human being is a producer and needs to be enlisted in the workforce to build a community, and to help each other,” said Mr Cahn. “Since the recession began, we’ve seen requests for start-up kits double in volume. Their chief function is as barter currency to provide a market when market is down,” he added.<

There are 300 active TimeBanks in 26 countries across the world and over 1,000,000 hours of service are exchanged through TimeBanks each year.

As the recession and Occupy movement encourage people to reimagine work and how they get their needs met in the new economy, Timebanks are catching fire. They are a clever tool to circumvent the scarcity and misdirection of conventional money. Timebanks are at heart a simple concept – you work for an hour, earn an hour credit, and spend an hour with anyone in your Timebank community. Timebanks don't pay taxes or get penalized in benefit reductions because they are more like charitable volunteering circles of mutual aid or relationship-based gift economies than market-based national currencies.

Timebank values are:

• We are all assets - we all have something to give.

• Some work is beyond price - work has to be redefined to value whatever it takes to create healthy, socially just, and sustainable communities and that work needs to be honored, recorded and rewarded.

• Reciprocity - helping works better as a two-way street and we need to work together to build better communities.

•We need each other- people help each other to reweave communities of support, strength & trust by creating relationships through exchanges.

• Respect - every human being matters and no one should go without getting their needs met regardless of their position in life. (Stemming from this, everyone’s hour is equal in a Timebank.)