Davis Dollars

Davis Dollars is an effort to create a Davis-wide community currency that students and local residents can use to keep money in the local economy.

Community currencies, or scrips, are used by many communities to stimulate a local economy, and give a lot of people a chance to offer, and use, services that wouldn't otherwise be utilized by the current US Dollar economy. Y'see, lots of people have lots of useful skills. I can do some woodworking, and take care of pets, and tend to a garden plot, and make you some wall art, and build you a bamboo floor lamp. You probably have skills of your own - you can teach photoshop, or fix a bike, or give a manicure or a haircut, or teach someone to cook or play guitar. But it'll be hard for any of us to get someone to pay us cold hard cash for these services, because people save their US bucks for rent and gas and tuition.

So when we create a community currency that can't be used for rent, people are much more willing to spend it on services from each other. It creates a network of people who are all working with and for each other, and it helps our productivity benefit our own community. It's really healthy, and it's great to be able to afford to pay someone to fix your bike - all you have to do is provide your own useful services to someone else!

So you like the idea of the community currency, and decide to support it by buying some. To find out the different ways you can spend it, you go on the community currency website to see the list of services and their prices offered by different members. You see someone is offering guitar lessons, and you contact the instructor, and set up a time to begin.

After your first lesson, you're pleased with the value of your currency, and decide you'd better earn some more so you can continue your lessons. You post several of your own services to the list – you're willing to take care of someone's garden plot on a regular basis; you'll help someone move out; you'll de-bug a computer. Your services are now online, and anyone interested can hire you.

You can think of several services you'd like offered, but which you don’t see anyone yet providing: car washing, clothing alterations, and salsa lessons. You post these to a “services wanted” list, with an amount you’d be willing to pay someone for each, so people can see what others see as useful services.

So with your initial purchase of currency, as long as you keep providing useful services, you can continue to take advantage of other services offered by others – you may never need to buy more currency again. And it’s all spent locally!

Additionally, we have a Volunteer Gardening Team. The vision of this team is to create an Edible Davis and share the gift of food and knowledge. If you would like to volunteer to build gardens, receive a garden, or both e-mail the Volunteer Gardeners at davisdollarsgardens@gmail.com!

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How does this relate to Davis Community Currency?

2009-07-19 16:28:54   Here's the tax implications http://www.irs.gov/taxtopics/tc420.html —JohnHumperdinkle