Reply #7: Here's a snippet about Burlington Bread

[depakid]

"That's the local currency that a few people developed in Burlington six or seven years ago—one of several thousand such currencies that have sprung up around the world. But like most of the American experiments, Burlington Bread has never broken out of the backrub and vegan-restaurant ghetto; it's basically a medium of exchange between earnest masseuses. Now, though, locals led by University of Vermont economics professor Bob Costanza are trying to make something more of it. Costanza, one of the founders of ecological economics, has proposed having the city issue Bread.

If they could use the currency to pay some municipal expenses, and in turn accept it for taxes and fees, then it would stand a chance of gaining a real foothold. In time, say Costanza's colleagues, 20 percent of Burlington's economy might use Bread instead of greenbacks—which, because it would give people money that only had value in the metro area, would automatically make local goods more competitive. Move that produce number from 8 percent to, say, 28 percent. Suddenly the town is a lot better situated for the post-oil world. And suddenly the town is not just a collection of unrelated individuals living in a vast planetary economy, but a real community in a real place filled with people who depend on one another in real ways.

Right now organizers are trying to persuade some of the city's many vendors to accept Bread in payment for their services—that's the test the city's mayor, Peter Clavelle, will use to decide if the project goes ahead or not. "It's a classic chicken-and-egg problem," says Ed Antczak of the city's Community and Economic Development Office. "The onus is on the local-currency people to prove over the next twelve months that there are vendors willing to take it from the city. It's like, 'Bring me the broomstick of the Witch of the West.' Because otherwise it's a little out there for the city to get involved."

http://www.orionsociety.org/pages/om/05-6om/McKibben.html