Tough economies

Barter trade is a form of alternative currency. Some like to use barter as a complimentary way of doing business or getting what you want, while others only turn to barter when there's more of a need.

As many of us have imagined, barter is especially useful in times of trouble. We envision the baker trading with the farmer for eggs, or the doctor bartering for help around the house. This is the pure and true form of barter. But dark times also bring new light in the community currencies and trade credit systems that grow, even as the broader economic market withers.

There is a clear and natural pattern of the use of barter and trade gaining extreme public popularity whenever times get tough.

External Links - Articles

Cash-strapped Argentines return to bartering system "... members offer services and goods in exchange for printed tickets called credits. The credits can only be spent at one of Argentina's 4,300 barter clubs. A whopping 40 million are now in circulation."

Zimbabwe Health Care, Paid With Peanuts "The hospital, along with countless Zimbabweans, turned to barter in earnest in 2008 when inflation peaked at what the International Monetary Fund estimates was an astonishing 500 billion percent, wiping out life savings, making even trillion-dollar notes worthless and propelling the health and education systems into a vertiginous collapse."