What if money ceased to exist?

[Big Disney Fan]

I know one thing: if money ceased to exist, all corporate types and Wall Street would all scream: "NO MONEY!!!! WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!!!!!"

[ajmrowland]

And China may be Communist, but it's arguable that they never were Communist to begin with.

WAT? What are you smoking?

True communism is an "everyone owns everything" kinda thing. aka, no homeless people cuz no one in the community owns any one house. the whole village/town does.

Now look at China.

Perhaps this...

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Oh thx for reminding me. I'm almost ou..........I mean, I've never even heard of that sh*t before in my life! how dare you suggest I'm smoking anything!

[littlefuzzy]

If someone made a wish, and Aladdin's Genie says "Ok, poof, there's no money in the world", society would collapse.

There would be massive looting - mostly for food instead of stereos, although probably anything that could be picked up would be taken. There would be people hoarding all the food they could get, armed groups taking over supermarkets, etc. People would kill one another for a can of peaches.

While I'm sure there would be many military, police, firemen, and medical workers who would keep working, I fear many more would quit going to work since they aren't being paid. People in more mundane positions would likely walk off their jobs in massive numbers. While a doctor might have a "higher calling" that would keep him healing people without pay, a factory worker at a food processing plant would have no such compunction.

There is no way for people to forage for food themselves anymore, our culture is 100% dependent on prepackaged and prepared food items. Obviously, a single person or small group of people could live off the land, particularly if they had the knowledge required to do so, but there is no way the land could support 311 million people simultaneously (or almost 7 billion worldwide.)

Farmers and ranchers wouldn't deliver their food to the markets without payment, and even if there were some altruistic souls who did share the food they grew, the whole infrastructure of getting it to the market is based on money - seeds for new crops/feed for animals, workers and equipment to tend and harvest the crops, truckers to ship it, gas for the trucks, factory workers to process it, more truckers to get it to the market, and so on.

The government (if it still existed) would have to nationalize all aspects of food production, as well as energy sources (gas for the trucks, power for the factories, etc.)

Whether under government control or in the hands of private individuals, there would still be a need for some sort of exchange system for goods and services. Pure barter would probably revert to an exchange system as well.

A pig farmer might only have pigs to trade (sure, he could trade packages of meat, but he'd have to make a deal with the butcher.) Is a pound of meat a fair trade for a loaf of bread? Eventually, he's going to not be able to trade his meat or pigs for something that he needs (maybe the other party already has all the pigs or meat that they can use for a while.) At some point, either he will trade the pigs to a third party "storage house" who gives him bread, milk, or other needs, or a system will develop where he gives someone a voucher for a pound of meat that they can collect when they need it.

Eventually those vouchers and records of "owed" goods will merge, and a common unit of exchange will develop. Instead of 1 pound of meat equaling 3 loaves of bread (or whatever), something like a "credit" will emerge, where one credit equals a pound of meat, or a dozen eggs, or 3 loaves of bread, or 2 pints of milk, etc. Possibly these credits will accumulate from working - 1 Credit equals 1 hour of work.

Poof, you've got money again!

The whole point of Star Trek's system is that the replicator exists. You can presumably replicate food, medicine, clothing, furniture, a structure (in pieces), robotic servants, books, CDs, DVDs, and other forms of education/entertainment, weapons, musical instruments, artwork, gold, diamonds, complex machinery and electronics, and possibly even energy - if you replicate a battery, is it charged? What if you replicate atomic material, can you use it to make a nuclear reactor? At the very least, you could replicate something flammable (gasoline, alchohol, etc.) and produce some energy that way.

You would have to have a way to deliver mass to the replicator, although that could be as simple as shoveling some dirt in from your back yard. Presumably there would be some sort of mass credit involved (on something like the Enterprise), to keep people from replicating their own starship or something.

[Goliath]

True communism is an "everyone owns everything" kinda thing. aka, no homeless people cuz no one in the community owns any one house. the whole village/town does.

That's right, but that's only communism in theory. But if we were only judging by theory, we couldn't call Cuba, Vietnam and North-Korea communist countries, while they clearly are. Communism in theory (no government, as the people govern themselves; no money, since everybody shares everything; no law enforcement, since nobody has to steal anymore) is a fantasy. It's never going to happen, because its basic premise seems to be that people are inherently good and not greedy, both which are not true.

The most radical communist 'experiment' took place between 1975-1979 in Cambodia, under the Khmer Rouge. The Khmer Rouge wanted to transform Cambodia into an 'agricultural self-sufficient paradise'. They abolished schools, all forms of telecommunications, banks and yes, even money. They abolished money. They also abolished the concept of 'family', seperating parents and children, indoctrinating them to love nothing besides the Party. They didn't allow any Western medication into the countries, which lead to the death of hundreds of thousands who could have been easily cured.

After they seized power, they used force to evacuate all of the cities' populations to the countryside. They were forced to do heavy agricultural labor, of which most knew nothing. This resulted in a great food shortage and massive famine. Hundreds of thousands either starved to death or were worked to death. I've even read accounts of people who had to cook and eat their dead family members to stay alive. Hundres of thousands of others were tortured to death or executed for being 'enemies of the revolution'. The Khmer Rouge specifically targeted intellectuals --even including all people who happened to wear glasses.

The Khmer Rouge's version of communism has to be the maddest, most insane, most cruel, most gruesome regime ever in history.

[ajmrowland]

^That's probably true. entire countries couldnt be theoretical communist. That would have a much better chance with very small communities, if those even exist anymore.

[Goliath]

^That's probably true. entire countries couldnt be theoretical communist. That would have a much better chance with very small communities, if those even exist anymore.

I've read an article in the paper last week about parts of the Congo, deep in the jungle, almost cut off from civilization, where the central government is totally absent and small communities have gone back to trading goods instead of using money.

[Big Disney Fan]

I wonder what would happen if money were to cease to exist and the corporates hear about this? They would probably collectively scream, "No money means no profits! And no profits means WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!!!!"

[Goliath]

I wonder what would happen if money were to cease to exist and the corporates hear about this? They would probably collectively scream, "No money means no profits! And no profits means WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!!!!"

Yeah, you already said that. You would make an excellent socialist, I suspect.

[Big Disney Fan]

No, I wouldn't.

[Goliath]

No, I wouldn't.

The way you're always railing against big corporations/Wall Street I think you would.

[Super Aurora]

Money made out of paper.

Paper comes from trees.

Money cease to exist=all trees been use up.

No trees=no source for oxygen.

No oxygen=we die.


Conclusion:

No money = we die.

[SpringHeelJack]

Isn't money more plant fibers ala cotton or something, though? Thus it's more likely that without money we'd have no cotton and thus the south will have to be known for something other than cotton plantations, mint juleps, and institutionalized racism.

[Big Disney Fan]

Isn't money more plant fibers ala cotton or something, though? Thus it's more likely that without money we'd have no cotton and thus the south will have to be known for something other than cotton plantations, mint juleps, and institutionalized racism.

And there would probably have never been a Civil War!

[Scarred4life]

No money = we die.

For some people, this is true for a different reason than the one you stated.