cyu
21st March 2012, 06:53
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/mar/16/greece-on-breadline-cashless-currency
Theodoros Mavridis has bought fresh eggs, tsipourou, fruit, olives, olive oil, jam, and soap. He has also had some legal advice, and enjoyed the services of an accountant to help fill in his tax return.
None of it has cost him a euro
Mavridis received a number of Local Alternative Units (known as tems in Greek) in his online network account. In return for the eggs, olive oil, tax advice and the rest, he transferred tems into other people's accounts.
Tems has been up and running for barely 18 months
she approached a woman who had come along with three large trays of homemade cakes and was selling them for a unit a cake. 'Do you think that's enough?' ...at the end she had three different kinds of fruit, two one-litre bottles of olive oil, soaps, beans, a dozen eggs and a whole lot of yoghurt. 'If I had bought all this at the supermarket,' she said, 'it would have cost me a great deal more than what it cost to make these cakes.'
Christos Pappionannou, a mechanical engineer runs the network's website using open-source software. No one may hold more than 1,200 tems in the account "so people don't start hoarding" ...no one may owe more than 300, so people "can't get into debt"
there was a new mood abroad in Greece, a determination to "move beyond anger to creativity"
"You are not poor when you have no money," she said, "you are poor when you have nothing to offer – except for the elderly and the sick, to whom we should all be offering."
Theodoros Mavridis has bought fresh eggs, tsipourou, fruit, olives, olive oil, jam, and soap. He has also had some legal advice, and enjoyed the services of an accountant to help fill in his tax return.
None of it has cost him a euro
Mavridis received a number of Local Alternative Units (known as tems in Greek) in his online network account. In return for the eggs, olive oil, tax advice and the rest, he transferred tems into other people's accounts.
Tems has been up and running for barely 18 months
she approached a woman who had come along with three large trays of homemade cakes and was selling them for a unit a cake. 'Do you think that's enough?' ...at the end she had three different kinds of fruit, two one-litre bottles of olive oil, soaps, beans, a dozen eggs and a whole lot of yoghurt. 'If I had bought all this at the supermarket,' she said, 'it would have cost me a great deal more than what it cost to make these cakes.'
Christos Pappionannou, a mechanical engineer runs the network's website using open-source software. No one may hold more than 1,200 tems in the account "so people don't start hoarding" ...no one may owe more than 300, so people "can't get into debt"
there was a new mood abroad in Greece, a determination to "move beyond anger to creativity"
"You are not poor when you have no money," she said, "you are poor when you have nothing to offer – except for the elderly and the sick, to whom we should all be offering."