Dec. 24, 1999

     JCT: In 1992, I wrote:

LETS IS SOCIAL CREDIT
     Why is it Social Credit?
     1) Because all credit system which bear no interest are social
friendly credit systems. Since LETS is an interest-free credit system,
there's no way to deny that lets belongs to the generic family of
credit systems which are social.
     2) Because I traveled Canada under the banner of Social Credit
Engineer advocating monetary reform and financed Michael Linton in the
development of the LETS system after approving the design as an
interest-free credit system. As far as I'm concerned, with the growing
success of the Greendollar social credit system around the world, I've
accomplished the monetary reform that Social Credit has always
advocated.
     The point is that any social credit system is the anti-thesis of
the anti-social usury credit and now that the LETSystem is universally
proven, the question is now optimizing growth.
     I happy to read of systems that use no computers and no
telephonic exchanges, etc. There was strenuous argument over whether
modified systems were really LETSystems or not. The point is they are
all social credit systems since the credit in all was friendly.
     Since Australia and New Zealand have large numbers of people who
have voted for Social Credit, it is their political duty to join a
system they have themselves advocated. I appreciate that their numbers
must be helping in the present growth but there's no reason they
shouldn't be enrolled en masse.
     Why doesn't the system give the respective Social Credit parties
a discount for volume and add their database? What's wrong with
explosive growth.
     What shocks me is that some people will publicly dismiss Social
Credit without ever having read any of its literature and based only
on writings from its detractors. To correct that problem, I'm posting
writings from Major Douglas and Louis Even for you to compare with
writings of LETSers on this conference. It shouldn't be long before
the similarities become apparent to most.
John C. Turmel, B. Eng., once called "The Social Credit Nut,"

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     JCT: I have been criticized by the Social Credit Secretariat for
claiming that the L.E.T.S. Local Employment-Trading System of
interest-free timecurrency is not social credit. I have also been
criticized by L.E.T.S.ers who say the same thing.
     I think this is the result of an improvement in Social Credit
made by the great Quebec Socred Louis Even of which many Anglo Socreds
are unaware. The most famous of his Quebec Social Credit stories is
called Salvation Island which can now be found at
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Rhodes/4061/english/myth01.htm
     http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Rhodes/4061/english/myth14.htm
shows that the roots of L.E.T.S. do come from the Quebec version
of Social Credit:

>Tom could read French. Curious, he sat down - and began to read the
>volume. His interest grew; his face lit up. "Well just look at this!"
>he cried out loud "This is something we should have known a long time
>ago. Money gets its value not from gold but from the products which
>that money buys." Simply put, money should be a sort of accountancy,
>credits passing from one account to another according to purchases
>and sales. The sum total of money will depend upon the sum total of
>production. "Each time production increases there is a corresponding
>increase in the amount of money. Never at any time should interest be
>paid on new money...
>
>Money - elementary accounting
>So Tom became the teacher. He taught the others what he had learned
>from that God-sent Social Credit publication.
>"This", he said "is what we can do without waiting for a banker and
>his keg of gold or without underwriting a debt.
>"I open an account in the name of each of you. In the right hand
>column are the credits which increase your account; to the left are
>the debits which subtract from your account.
     JCT: Any L.E.T.S.ers must recognize that this is exactly what
L.E.T.S. systems do. They open an account in the name of every member
to which may be add gains and from which may be subtracted payments.
     I do not use the words "debit" and "credit" because accounting
uses them backwards. Though the word "debit" sounds like a "debt" which
should be subtracted from an account, to an economist or accountant, a
debit is a number which is added to the account. Though the word
credit sounds like something which should be added to an account, to
an economist or accountant, a credit is something which is subtracted
from an account. Remember that the accounting of finance has been
designed to mislead on purpose so that when an accountant uses the
words debit and credit as they understand them, it will inevitably
confuse ordinary people and when ordinary people use the words as they
understand them, it will inevitably confuse the economists.

>"Each wants $200 to begin with. Very well. We write $200 to the
>credit of each. Each immediately has $200.
     JCT: Though most L.E.T.S. accounts start at zero rather than
+200, the Ithaca system starts at +40 where every new member is given
4 Hours of currency to start with. Quebec Social Crediters have
recognized and promoted the Ithaca system for the reason that both
start by giving each member a positive balance to work with though the
success of L.E.T.S. which let people vary their accounts around zero
prove that this is not truly necessary.

>"Frank buys some goods from Paul for $10. I deduct $10 from Frank
>leaving him $190. I add $10 to Paul and he now has $210.
     JCT: This is how Ithaca Hours would be transferred. In a
L.E.T.S., Frank is left with -10 and Paul is not at +10. No
substantial difference between the two accounting systems though some
L.E.T.S.ers have stated that the fact the Ithaca model fluctuates
around a positive number rather than zero makes it "not" a L.E.T.S.
That both systems have the identical Laplace Transform equation and
that both function identically seems to elude them.

>"Jim buys from Paul to the amount of $8. I deduct from Jim $8 leaving
>him $192. Paul now has $218.
>"Paul buys wood from Frank for $15. I deduct $15 from Paul leaving
>$203. I add 15 to Frank's account and it goes back to $205.
>And so we continue; from one account to another in the same fashion
>as paper banknotes go from one man's pocket to another's.
     JCT: In exactly the same fashion as an Ithaca paper banknote goes
from one man's pocket to another's.

>"If someone needs money to expand production, we issue him the
>necessary amount of new credit. Once he has sold his products he
>repays the sum to the credit fund. The same with public works; paid
>for by new credits.
     JCT: They forgot to mention that when they issued him the new
credit, he also acquired an equivalent new debt but then they do
mention that he repaid it when he sold his product. So evidently, they
keep track of his debt as a negative somewhere though they don't
state it clearly.

>"Likewise, each one's account is periodically increased but without
>taking credits from anyone, in order that all may benefit from the
>progress society makes. That's the national dividend. In this fashion
>money becomes an instrument of service."
     JCT: Again, though this is unnecessary as long as new credits are
available whenever needed, the positive number picked makes no
difference to the accountancy in any way. Everyone could start with a
million dollars and the same transactions would result in the same
differentials.

>The banker's despair
>Everyone understood. The members of this little community became
>Crediters. The following day, Oliver, the banker received a letter
>signed by the five:
>"Dear sir. without the slightest necessity you have plunged us into
>debt and exploited us. We don't need you anymore to run our money
>system. From now on we'll have all the money we need without your
>gold, debts or thieves.
>We are establishing, at once, the system of Social Credit on the
>island. The national dividend is going to replace the national debt.
>"If you insist on being repaid, we can repay you all the money you
>gave us. But not a cent more. You can't lay claim to that which you
>have not made.
     JCT: What is interesting is that this is exactly the argument
used by all the people who used my Stiff the Bank kits with which to
stall their foreclosures. Many such articles can be found in my press
archives. The argument we used was that we accepted the responsibility
for the principal but repudiated the interest. It is also the argument
used by the servant in the Parable of the Talents where he gave back
the principal but would not pay any interest.
     So how can L.E.T.S.ers who regularly use their own community
credits in exactly the same way as described by this early Quebec
Social Credit publication fail to see the roots of their own system?
And now that Quebec Socreds have seen that L.E.T.S. is the fulfillment
of exactly what the kind of Social Credit they advocate in their own
greatest publication, why can't Anglo Socreds see it too? Of course,
English Socreds can be forgiven for not seeing the parallel since the
requirements that credit be social only when credit is interest-free
was not taught to them and many still hold that credit can be social
even if you loanshark it out.
     I recently read a post from Australian Social Crediter Vic
Bridger where he pointed out that Major Douglas did not insist that
credit be interest-free in order that credit be social and I can
understand why he would have thought so since he was going to
counteract the imbalance by creating and giving out new credit. So
even though Douglas may not have seen that the problem of the
imbalance he described via his A+B theorem could be eliminated at the
root by abolishing the interest, it is evident that the Quebec branch
of Social Credit did determine that the problem could be solved by
running an interest-free L.E.T.S. credit system as advocated above.
     So though it would not be accurate to say that the greatly
successful L.E.T.S. has its roots in English Social Credit, I think
the above makes it pretty clear that the L.E.T.S. community banking
system does have its roots in Quebec Social Credit.
     What I find amusing is that English Socreds still can't see the
that L.E.T.S. is the improved French version of Social Credit but what
is not amusing is that they claim to themselves the right to state
that L.E.T.S. is not a Social Credit system. To every Quebecker who
has ever learned Social Credit, it is. The fact that the Michael
Fighting Journal from Rougemont Quebec has recently endorsed the
Ithaca Hours system is clear proof that they see the link even if it
is an admission that their brand of social credit is not the same as
that of the founder even though their brand is a clearly superior
model to his. The fact that Quebec Social Credit is being practiced
around the world via L.E.T.S. and that English Social Credit is
nothing more than an now-not-needed theory should make it clear that
the improved Quebec Social Credit is here to stay while the inferior
English Social Credit which permits usury will never see the light of
day.
     Finally, the fact that I, a former leader of the Social Credit
Party of Ontario, financed the development of the L.E.T.S. software
should be another indication of system's Social Credit roots.

--
John C. Turmel