How many ounces to the Brixton pound?

The plot hinges on the consequences of the discovery of an ancient charter on a bombsite confirming that Pimlico is really Burgundian territory, beyond the legal control of Whitehall and central government. The implications are hugely significant for local residents when war-time rationing and identity cards still applied across Britain.

It’s worth watching for the glimpses into everyday life in Britain just four years after WW2 ended.

Cash transactions in sterling already operate at an effective 10% discount to bank based transactions for the same reasons and I have no problem with anyone attempting to deny Gordon his booty.

But Brixton pounds will never be used to contribute to the benefit payments paid to it’s residents.

Anything that might eventually take central control of trade away from central banks and government is worth giving serious considerion in my opinion. The growth in voluntary currencies might introduce people to this idea.

“If people choose to trade in potatoes that’s up to them, as long as there are other options too.”

I agree with you entirely. I’m not saying that the Brixton Pounds should be banned or closed down at all: I just don’t see the point of it.

I commend it to all Brixtonians.

Btw practically every week during my boyhood, we did our family shopping in Brixton but then I was born in Lambeth a long time ago and still wax nostalgic over the Lambeth Walk:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3oimHJCURbo

Personally, I don’t have a view for or against the scheme, but I do have the advantages

(a) of bothering to try and see what the scheme is and what it is not ;
(b) of having lived in Brixton for a period and therefore having some idea as to what the scheme is trying to protect and accomplish.

On the general point of privately-issued and competing currencies, as opposed to this specific scheme, I also have the advantage of experience in working in markets and fairs, unlike, I’ll venture, most of the teenage libertarians who think that a plethora of privately-issued currencies is a good thing. Because I actually have this experience – as do, for instance, the people who work at Brixton market – I know that at times during the day when business is brisk, and you are busy givig change with one hand and displaying goods to a customer with another, the last thing you actually want is to be trying to calculate whether today the Zonk is circulating at 1.25 to the Wodget or whether the Hayek is worth fourteen or fifteen Rands. Where actual paper cash transactions in the street are concerned, having just one currency to deal with is really quite a good idea.

The ruling class bit is obviously my judgement rather than something you’ve said directly.

Eh? What on earth have I said there that “suits the interests of the ruling class”?

Further, I’m not a libertarian, rather a classical liberal. The point about a medium of exchange is straight from Adam Smith….

Nonetheless, that doesn’t in itself mean this is a bad thing – I’m fairly neutral about it. If people choose to trade in potatoes that’s up to them, as long as there are other options too. In a sense this is little different from Scottish money.

What is most interesting to me about this thread is the division between a consistent localist & libertarian like Nick – I can absolutely see from his perspective why he’d welcome this – and someone like Tim Worstall, who’s a libertarian when it suits the interests of the ruling class.

Nick – I understand why in theory you’d want to let the market set the value of the Brixton pound, but don’t you think that in practice as soon as a Brixton pound stopped being equivalent to a GBP, its market value would immediately collapse? Surely the use of the Brixton pound depends on it being tied to British currency? I’m not sure you could ever float the Brixton pound.

“The sooner we move to a single global currency the sooner the evil that is purchasing power parity will become meaningless….”

Err, you seem not to know what PPP actually is.

Umm, one way of looking at PPP is that it’s an attempt to examine the world as if we do already have a single global currency…..

This press released give the impression that large chain retailers, and one imagines other large companies, suck the money out of Brixton. As if Brixtonians hold a stock of money which will one day be depleted by face sucking multinationals. In fact, if large retailers are continually taking money out of Brixton, somebody else must be continuallly be putting money in otherwise the chain retailers would run out of money to suck. Do NEF imagine this scheme can stop the flows out without stopping the flows in?

If people wish to support local producers, they are already free to do so using pounds sterling. Why does the NEF think people aren’t already supporting the producers they wish to support? I guess you could tell some story about people being consumer drones lured by the siren song of Primark, and this currency is a means of tying oneself to the mast. A change in the pattern of trade away from Primark and towards Joe Bloggs Clothing Emporium would appear to help Joe Bloggs, but what can Joe spend his new Brixton Pounds income on? A new electric car manufacturered in Brixton? Some solar panels for his house? Can Joe buy stock for his Emporium with Brixton Pounds? How much would the clothes in his Emporium cost if he was constrained only to buying stock manufactured in Brixton? Constraining exchange to take place within Brixton means that the real wage (wage/prices) will be a function of productivity within Brixton, and I’m guessing that the variety of goods and services produced in Brixton is lesser than that produced worldwide and prices will be higher. Less choice and higher prices! Another victory for the working people of the world, brought to you by the left wing!

Increase the prosperity of the people of Brixton would be a fine idea, but I think these involve increasing the money flowing into Brixton, not trying to trap it there.

As far as I can see, they’re not, unless you can see an otherwise invisble part of the story that says shops accepting the Brixton currency will no longer accept sterling.

Incidentally, there is NOTHING intrinsically parochial or xenophobic about a local currency. Even under these circumstances, there is no way that the B£ could be artificially limited to one area if it proved popular. If people want to accept it for whatever reason, they will accept it.