Imagine if Silver Lake had its own currency. A dollar that could be exchanged along side our regular dollar but a small percentage of the profits from each sale would go toward funding local schools. A system like this is known as a Complimentary Currency system, the topic of a lecture given recently in Santa Monica. The lecture was given by Prof. Declan Kennedy , an architect, urban planner, and Chairman of the Board for Gaia University . Its focus was on innovative ways communities are keeping wealth and value localized, often by using Complimentary Currencies. What is a Complimentary Currency, you ask?

An easy way to understand Complimentary Currencies is to think of frequent flyer miles. An airline gives you points and eventually free tickets for using their services. In return you are more likely to use their services and stay in their economic system. A Complimentary Currency functions in a similar way, localizing monetary value and keeping it from migrating out of the community. In a capitalist marketplace, inflation (the prices of goods rising & the value of currency falling) is an inevitability. This inflation is often due to the migration of wealth from place to place and from class to class. One of the major benefits of a Complimentary Currency is that it keeps wealth within the community, by the simple premise that it has no value outside of it, and that makes such currencies inflation-resistant. Here are some examples:

The Fureai-Kippu , Japanese for "Caring Relationship Tickets", is a system in which you earn credits by helping elderly people. Imagine an elderly man, who can no longer shop for his own groceries. If you do his shopping for him, you earn credits based on the number of hours worked. These credits can be saved and later spent on your own old age, or can be transferred to your parents if they live far away from you. China is currently working on implementing a similar plan. Another example is the Saber of Brazil, in which senior students tutor junior students and earn currency that can only be spent at University. Or the Chiemgauer of Germany that is traded right along side of the Euro for goods and services. In the circulation of the Chiemgauer a small percentage is deducted and is then allocated toward helping local schools. Germany actually has 17 active Complimentary Currencies.

In all of these examples, the Complimentary Currencies are "use" oriented instead of profit oriented and all of them are inflation resistant. In the case of the Chiemgauer it actually fights inflation in the primary currency as well. When inflation in the primary currency goes up they start trading the Complimentary Currency more, and it serves to stabilize the economy.

The innovative thing about Complimentary Currencies is that each system is determined and sustained by its creators and therefore they stand to benefit the most from it. In the current expanding global marketplace where it is becoming easier and easier for wealth to trickle out of communities and flow from the lower class to the upper, digging the roots on inequity deeper into our economies, it may just be something like the Silver Lake dollar that stems the tide.