While almost all the World faces the inflation and high bank rates troubles, in general facing the world crisis, I wonder if coming to the beginings would be an answer… I mean a system based on exchanging goods for goods, called bartering.
Of course, I’m aware, that I didn’t invented anything new, and especially nowdays there are cultures within modern society who still rely on this type of exchange.
Bartering has been around for a very long time, I suppose, it appeard as soon as the human cultures started to arise.
However, it's not necessarily something that an economy or society has relied solely on, this system has been used for centuries and long before money was invented.
As the number of people increased, they had to travel long distances to find food. They started forming groups. The members of each group stayed together while traveling and hunting, and they refrained from any interaction with other groups. Gradually, inter-group interaction started and this paved way for the system of trading. After years of nomadic life, people started settling down in areas, where they began growing plants and raising farm animals. As cultivation and farming flourished, people started developing other skills too, and they started exchanging their goods for what they needed. This type of exchange was mainly done to fulfill basic needs, like food, clothes, etc.
The history of bartering dates all the way back to 6000 BC. Introduced by Mesopotamia tribes, bartering was adopted by Phoenicians. Phoenicians bartered goods to those located in various other cities across oceans. Babylonians also developed an improved bartering system.
Goods were exchanged for food, tea, weapons, and spices. At times, human skulls were used as well. Salt was another popular item exchanged. Salt was so valuable that Roman soldiers' salaries were paid with it.
It seems like a perfect way of geeting independence, evrything you need, you can swap for goods uyou recently go tor services that you can deliver… well, not exacly In spite of all greatness of barters system idea, it had a lot of difficiencies, hard to get over.
The main thing is, transportation, it seems to be really difficult to carry and use these materials, so traders wanted something that was not perishable and easy to carry, as a medium of exchange. This led to the use of metal pieces as money. It is believed that the first recognizable metal coins appeared in China, during 1000 B.C. However, the first minted coins are believed to be made in some regions of Turkey, like Lydia. Around 600 B.C. and this is, how the story of money begins (in short of course, I’d like to close it in next articles).
Good explanation of bartering system is intoduced at this short movie:
However when money was invented, bartering did not end, it became more organized and adapted to the times.
Everytime, when market (local, or even countries or world market) was facing financial crisis, communities tried to come back to barter system. For example: due to lack of money, bartering became popular again in the 1930s during the Great Depression. It was used to obtain food and various other services. It was done through groups or between people who acted like banks. If any items were sold, the owner would receive credit and the buyer's account would be debited.
Nowdays, when the World is strugling with inflation, disruption of supply chains, and all kind of ecomomic and logistic obstacles, mayby its time to return to bertering system, and what will be advance, there are many modern solutions, wchich will improve it a lot (see: cryptocurrency).
But its an issue, I’d like to mention in my future articles.
I hope that you enjoyed this one,
see you next time!
