Bartering

[Schrödinger's Cat]

This is just a subject I'd like to have other opinions come together on.

Bartering of goods and services could well be done after achieving communism. Certainly there would be items you can't mass-produce or replicate. A family heirloom for one. I was curious as to how you think the position of the community will be towards bartering? I don't see banning it as practical, nor even would I want something like that to happen when the system [or lack thereof] is based around free association and decision-making.

"Commodity" money could well exist after "representative" and "fiat" money is gone.

I wonder what your opinion is on bartering post-capitalism.

[rouchambeau]

Bartering of goods and services could well be done after achieving communism.
No, that's impossible. In communism there is no such thing as exchange of one thing for another.

[Schrödinger's Cat]

Originally posted by [email protected] 26, 2007 06:29 pm

Bartering of goods and services could well be done after achieving communism.
No, that's impossible. In communism there is no such thing as exchange of one thing for another.
That's a rather naive stance. Not every item will be available for mass production, and there will certainly exist goods and services that can not be replicated. If I create my own gadget at own leisure, there's nothing that would compel me to introduce it to workers other than social prestige. Certainly this may compel individuals, but there are also individuals who would want to barter for other goods that aren't mass produced.

[Eleftherios]

Originally posted by [email protected] 26, 2007 12:02 am
Bartering of goods and services could well be done after achieving communism.
It won't happen. Societies usually resort to a barter economy when hyperinflation hits and there is a severe economic slump.

[Luís Henrique]

To put it bluntly, bartering is a less advanced and less efficient way to redistribute goods than a capitalist market with a general equivalent.

A society that relies on bartering is a pre-capitalist society, not a post-capitalist one.

(Bartering is sheer horror. Imagine if instead of being able to pay your shoes with cash, you had to figure how to find the beer bottle the shoemaker wants in exchange for the shoes.)

Luís Henrique

[More Fire for the People]

Bartering is a good way to develop a friendship, not communism.

[Schrödinger's Cat]

I think most everyone who has responded mistook what I said as some advocacy for bartering:

Bartering won't be how society operates, but it will certainly exist between individuals.

[Lynx]

If you want to trade or swap something you cannot otherwise obtain, I don't see the harm. It's a form of recycling :)

Think eBay without prices!