What I think you don't get is that something like gold, which cannot reasonably be considered to lose value, and has real value, is ideal. This is a very useful property for money.
I have for years understood that.
It is ideal until people need food, fuel, and shelter.
When a loaf of bread, pack of tobacco, and bottle of whiskey is worth more than a gram of gold.
Yea, but it *still works as a measuring rod*. If you need to pay a bar of gold for a loaf of bread, fine, then maybe 2 bars for really good bread. *Now we know the difference in cost*.
Most other things, like attendance-time has a very flimsy value. Does a baby have the attendance value as a reliable, skilled worker? Of course not, baby can have negative such value.
So now you have the problem of deciding the attendance-time value of each person, cause it really does vary. Very useful people do have higher attendance value than slobs.
Very useful people do not barter their own time - they prefer to barter other people's time.
Such things btw has been tried in history. If you tie value to i.e. potatoes, then people will start growing potatoes that are barely edible, cause they are cheaper to grow.
"Such things btw has been tried in history." ...by predators running government scams.
It is a also a tradition with some religious communities, but it fails within cults.
I.e. it sets the wrong incentives. Same with man attendance. Also, if you do find such a standard, it would still be best to just use that standard. I.e. if Gold is chosen, then...
normally you use either gold directly or promises for gold. Not man-hours and the like, because then people need to calculate the difference, know the exchange rate and so on.
For man-hours, I would have to know the reliability of each worker in order to decide gold exchange-rate. It's better to call those "contracts", and have trained economists trade them
For man-hours, anyone would already know the credibility of whoever inked the note.
It has zero relevance to the issuers muscle or skill or time. It is all about his credibility.
OK, I think this is the time for me to stop. I find the problems I bring up to make your setup into a mess, one which I would not like, and you don't seem to care. I suppose I should
kind of take your advice here, and judge the credibility of something based on experience. I judge your payment-system not to be credible based on our conversation.
Thank you for your critique
Usually what I am told is "Why are you always so negative?". This is definitely an improvement. :)
... if you still feel the need to have them as an option for "payment". I.e. normal people will then not have to speculate on such values, but those who want to can.
