{"id":13788,"date":"2015-10-25T07:56:05","date_gmt":"2015-10-25T12:56:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=13788"},"modified":"2015-10-25T07:56:05","modified_gmt":"2015-10-25T12:56:05","slug":"barcelona-threatens-to-print-parrallel-currency-madrid-seethes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=13788","title":{"rendered":"Barcelona Threatens to Print Parrallel Currency, Madrid Seethes"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3 class=\"entry-title\"><a href=\"http:\/\/wolfstreet.com\/2015\/10\/24\/barcelona-threatens-to-print-parrallel-currency-madrid-seethes\/\" target=\"_blank\">Barcelona Threatens to Print Parrallel Currency, Madrid Seethes<\/a><\/h3>\n<p>Over the next six months, Barcelona\u2019s left-wing city council plans to roll out a cash-less\u00a0local currency that has the potential to become the largest of its kind in the world. The main goal of the project, according to a council spokesperson, is to boost economic opportunities for local businesses and traders.<\/p>\n<p>The idea is for local stores and residents to be able to exchange euros for the new currency at a one-to-one parity, and use it to purchase products and services at a discount or with other kinds of incentives. But it doesn\u2019t end there: the new parallel currency may also be used to pay certain subsidies, taxes and local services such as public transport,\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/elpais.com\/elpais\/2015\/06\/15\/inenglish\/1434381130_242225.html\">reports<\/a>\u00a0El Pa\u00eds. Municipal workers could also receive part of their salary in the new money.<\/p>\n<p>Barcelona will not be the first European city to launch such a scheme. Local currencies are all the rage these days. There could be as many as 3,000 forms of local money in use around the globe, says Community Currencies in Action, a global partnership promoting such schemes that is part-funded by the European Union\u2019s Regional Development Fund. Which begs the question\u2026<\/p>\n<h3><strong>Why\u2019s the EU promoting parallel local currencies around the world?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>According to the official blurb, it is to support local small and medium-size enterprises\u00a0(SME) as well as offer new tools for social inclusion and environmental protection. This comes\u00a0from an organization that has so far shown scant regard for SMEs [read\u2026\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/wolfstreet.com\/2015\/02\/18\/smaller-businesses-fear-the-wrath-of-us-eu-trade-deal\/\" target=\"_blank\">Small Businesses Dread the Wrath of US-EU \u201cFree Trade\u201d Deal]<\/a>, social inclusion and environmental protection (read\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/business\/2015\/oct\/23\/ttip-eu-negotiators-appear-to-break-environmental-pledge-in-leaked-draft\" target=\"_blank\">this\u00a0<\/a>and\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/ragingbullshit.com\/2015\/10\/23\/dirty-hands-on-dirty-deals-ttip-and-cop21-shaped-by-same-big-business-interests\/\" target=\"_blank\">this<\/a>).<\/p>\n<p>Perhaps there are somewhat less altruistic motives behind the EU\u2019s agenda \u2014 motives such as encouraging people to embrace cashless currencies. As I warned in\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/wolfstreet.com\/2015\/04\/25\/don-quijones-war-on-cash-quotes-to-cashless-society\/\" target=\"_blank\">The War on Cash in 10 Spine-Chilling Quotes<\/a>, the war on cash has moved from one of words to actions.<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Barcelona Threatens to Print Parrallel Currency, Madrid Seethes Over the next six months, Barcelona\u2019s left-wing city council plans to roll out a cash-less\u00a0local currency that has the potential to become the largest of its kind in the world. The main goal of the project, according to a council spokesperson, is to boost economic opportunities for [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,5,6],"tags":[951,5660,279,284,10190,495,536,7185,743,4255],"class_list":["post-13788","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics","category-geopolitics","category-liberty","tag-currency","tag-don-quijones","tag-eu","tag-european-union","tag-local-money","tag-madrid","tag-money","tag-parallel-currency","tag-spain","tag-wolfstreet"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13788","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13788"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13788\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13789,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13788\/revisions\/13789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}