In depth — Solidarity Economy
Why we need a different economy
Before explaining how the Club's credits work, it is worth explaining why they exist. That means how the money we all use every day is created, and who gains from it. Written for people who are not economists.
An honest note up front. This text deliberately simplifies economic subjects that are very complex: it is here to make people think and talk, not to replace studying the field. Some of the positions taken are a critical reading of the present system, not absolute truths. To go deeper, use the official sources — ECB, Federal Reserve, Congressional Budget Office — listed at the foot of the page.
Where the reasoning starts
The Club has one purpose: to spread good sense as the principle by which a society is organised — that is, more survival, a better way of life and more abundance for the greatest possible number of beings, people, animals and plants, without forgetting the spiritual side of life. The full definition is in the Charter of Values.
We come back to the practical pillars throughout the page, but they are these:
- three criteria for judging anything: survival, abundance, quality of life;
- two golden rules as the ethical foundation;
- four levels of universal exchange;
- a system of credits — possibly on blockchain technology — as an ethical alternative to ordinary currency;
- the real value of a society: mutual help;
- cooperation between responsible, rational people, to reduce chaos and allow personal growth.
In short: a civic organisation offering practical tools for building a society on measurable criteria of collective wellbeing. Good sense, here, is a method: you judge an action or a system by measuring how much it really improves the survival, the quality of life and the abundance of the greatest number of people.
1. How money actually works
Modern money is called fiat currency: it is no longer anchored to gold reserves, and it is created essentially as debt.
In practice: the government needs money, so it issues debt securities — U.S. Treasuries, Italian BTPs — which are bought by banks, funds and investors.
The central bank creates digital money — what is called bank money — out of nothing, at practically zero cost, by entering numbers into a computer. Paper banknotes, by contrast, cost something to produce: a few cents each, whatever value is printed on them. The gap between the cost of producing money and its face value produces an enormous profit for whoever issues it: this is called seigniorage. Whoever has the power to create money acquires real wealth at almost no cost; the rest of society accepts that money in exchange for real goods, services and work.
Here is the critical point: the system creates the money for the loan, but not the money needed to pay the interest on it as well. That “extra” money simply does not exist in the system. This is why public debt tends to grow and grow.
The government then puts that money into the economy by paying for roads, schools, police and fire services.
Money is like blood in a body: it keeps goods and services moving. If too little of it circulates, or it collects in too few hands, society falls ill.
2. Where the imbalances come from
Almost all money today is digital. Cash is a small part of the money in circulation — estimates put it between 3% and 10% depending on the country and the definition. The rest is numbers managed by banks and by private networks such as Visa and Mastercard.
Every digital payment carries a fee. A small share moves from the people who produce — shopkeepers, tradespeople, farmers — to the financial system. A $100 bill, after thirty or fifty changes of hand, is still worth $100; a card payment reduces the amount that reaches its destination by 1–3% every time. In the United States, banks and intermediaries collect tens of billions of dollars a year this way.
Finance does not create real goods. It generates money from money, without producing food, objects or services that are useful in everyday life. And the more capital sits still and accumulated, the less money circulates in the economy that produces tangible things.
3. The real cost: interest on the American debt
One concrete example makes it all clearer. Every year the United States spends an enormous sum on interest on the national debt alone: recent estimates put it somewhere between $880 billion and more than $1 trillion. It is a figure that moves fast: anyone who wants the current number will find it at U.S. Treasury – Fiscal Data or at the Congressional Budget Office.
A few proportions, to get the order of magnitude:
- interest spending has grown a great deal in recent years, above all after the rate rises from 2022 onwards;
- it accounts for a growing share of the federal budget;
- in some recent fiscal years it has exceeded — or come close to — military spending, depending on whether gross or net interest is counted.
One clarification, so that the blame lands in the right place: this interest does not go only “to the banks”, but to everyone holding U.S. Treasury securities — pension funds, insurers, investment funds, foreign investors such as China and Japan, and private citizens. It remains true, though, that those who benefit most are those who already hold large amounts of capital.
4. Democracy and the weight of money
Money is one of the main instruments through which those with strong economic interests can influence politics. The mechanism is well known and much studied: politicians need funding for their election campaigns, and those with large amounts of capital can offer support in exchange for favourable legislation. Over time, the risk is that institutions represent the majority of citizens less and less.
One documented historical case is that of William Randolph Hearst, the American press magnate at the turn of the twentieth century, associated with what became known as “yellow journalism”: a sensationalist use of newspapers that shaped public opinion and helped create the climate that led to the Spanish-American War of 1898. Distant in time, but real: large private interests can steer information and politics.
5. The proposal: the Club's credits
Governments are unlikely to change the system from above. So the change has to come from below, from citizens who are more aware and more active. This is where the Club's discount credits come from.
Someone helps
A person helps someone else free of charge: a piece of work, a service, teaching a skill, any useful contribution.
The Club certifies it
It issues a certificate — a credit, or voucher — representing the help that was given.
The credit goes to whoever helped
Not to whoever received the help, and not to whoever spent the most.
It is spent in the network
Whoever holds it exchanges it for food, goods or services at the businesses taking part in the project — not the large chains.
How it differs from an ordinary discount voucher
| Traditional voucher | Club credit |
|---|---|
| Used once and thrown away | Keeps circulating |
| Controlled by large companies | Stays between local businesses and citizens |
| Rewards consumption | Rewards mutual help |
| Value set from above | Value based on help actually given |
The more people help each other, the more credits are created: new blood for a healthy and ethical economy.
Clear rules are needed against speculation, lending, inflation and deflation. Credits can be on paper or digital, possibly on blockchain technology. The rules in force, the costs and how it works at the checkout are on the How credits work page.
6. The underlying principle
The real value of a society lies in mutual help: contributing work, producing food, keeping the environment clean, educating, passing on skills, resolving conflicts and ensuring justice, preserving and handing down culture and art, doing research, advancing knowledge, maintaining roads, communications and transport. And more besides.
Some attempts to change things from above do exist. Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, the United Arab Emirates and Indonesia — together with ten partner countries, with Saudi Arabia about to join — are building within the BRICS a trading system independent of the dollar. The aim is to escape the geopolitical leverage of the petrodollar, the instrument with which the United States has economically isolated countries such as Venezuela and Iran through sanctions. The bloc already accounts for around 41% of world GDP at purchasing power parity and 45% of the population. The concrete instrument is BRICS Pay, an international payment network as an alternative to SWIFT, due to launch at the New Delhi summit in September 2026. It is still a change from above, though: it does not touch the way money is created.
Historically, barter evolved into gold coins: more practical, but limited in quantity and therefore unable to sustain a growing economy. Out of that came the modern banking system — convenient and scalable, but, on this critical reading, built to favour those who already hold capital over those who create real value.
The proposal is to build an alternative from below, on a simple principle.
As long as a person helps others and is willing to be helped, things work.
Today even the most capable and motivated people scatter their energy in a hundred directions. The Club wants to offer a practical tool for channelling it towards a fairer economy: one act of help at a time.
Notes for the reader
This page offers a critical reading of the present economic system: some of the positions are opinions and interpretations, not absolute facts. For more rigorous study:
| Subject | Recommended source |
|---|---|
| How money is created | Bank of England, Money creation in the modern economy (2014) |
| American debt and interest | Congressional Budget Office (CBO), U.S. Treasury Fiscal Data |
| Monetary aggregates (M0, M1, M2) | ECB, Federal Reserve |
| Inequality and capital | World Inequality Database, OECD |
| Media and power (Hearst) | Historical encyclopedias, entries on yellow journalism |
Disclaimer. This document is not financial, legal or tax advice. Before starting a project involving exchanges of value, credits and blockchain technology, consulting an accountant and a lawyer is strongly recommended: specific tax and anti-money-laundering rules apply.
Glossary
The words used on this page, explained without jargon.
Open the glossary — 44 entries, from A to Y
A
- Anti-money laundering (AML)
- Laws and rules that stop money obtained illegally from being passed off as legitimate income. Any project involving exchanges of value has to comply with them.
B
- Bank money (book money)
- Money that exists only as an accounting entry in the banks' systems, not as cash. When a bank grants a loan, it effectively creates new money by typing numbers into an account.
- Barter
- Direct exchange of goods or services without using money: the farmer gives the blacksmith grain in return for a tool. It is the oldest form of trade, older than the invention of money.
- Blockchain
- Technology that records transactions in a chain of blocks shared across thousands of computers. No single person or company controls it, and the data is very hard to alter or falsify. Think of: a public ledger everyone can read and nobody can quietly erase.
C
- Capital
- Money or assets — property, investments, equipment — that a person or an organisation owns and can use to generate more wealth. On this page “large capital” means substantial financial resources in the hands of wealthy people or institutions.
- Central bank
- Public institution that manages a country's money supply and interest rates: the Federal Reserve in the United States, the ECB in the euro area. It is not a commercial bank: private citizens cannot open an account with it.
- Certified Public Accountant (CPA)
- A licensed accountant in the United States, qualified to audit accounts and file tax returns on a client's behalf.
- Circulation (of money)
- The movement of money through the economy as people earn, spend and invest. Healthy circulation means money moving freely between consumers, businesses and workers.
- Congressional Budget Office (CBO)
- Independent U.S. government agency that analyses the federal budget and the economic outlook. Its reports are among the most reliable sources on American public finances.
- Currency
- The monetary system in use in a country or region: the U.S. dollar, the euro, the pound.
D
- Debt securities
- Financial instruments issued by a state or a company to borrow money from investors. Whoever issues them promises to repay the sum plus interest by a given date. Examples: U.S. Treasuries, Italian BTPs.
- Deflation
- A general fall in prices over time. It sounds like good news, but it can be dangerous: if people expect prices to fall further, they stop spending and the economy slows down.
- Democracy
- A system of government in which citizens choose their representatives through elections and have a say in how they are governed.
E
- European Central Bank (ECB)
- The central bank of the countries that use the euro. It runs monetary policy for the area, sets interest rates and oversees the money supply.
F
- Federal budget
- The state's annual financial plan: how much it takes in through taxes and other revenue, how much it spends on defence, health, infrastructure and everything else.
- Federal Reserve (“the Fed”)
- The central bank of the United States. It manages the money supply, sets benchmark interest rates and works to keep employment and inflation stable.
- Fiat currency
- Money that has value because a government declares it legal tender, not because it is backed by a physical commodity such as gold. Almost all modern currencies are fiat. “Fiat” is Latin: “let it be done”.
- Fiscal
- To do with the state's finances: taxes, spending, debt. “Fiscal policy” means the decisions on how the state raises and spends money.
- Fiscal year
- A twelve-month accounting period used by governments and businesses. The American federal one runs from 1 October to 30 September, not from January to December.
- Foreign investors
- People, companies or governments from other countries investing in a nation's economy, for instance by buying Treasury securities. China and Japan are among the largest foreign holders of American debt.
- Fractional reserve
- The system under which banks have to keep only a fraction of deposits on hand: the rest they can lend out. This is how banks create new money by lending.
G
- GDP — Gross Domestic Product
- The total value of the goods and services produced in a country in a year. It is used to measure the size and health of an economy.
- Gross and net interest
-
- Gross: the total paid on the debt, with nothing subtracted.
- Net: what is left after subtracting the interest the state earns on its own financial assets.
I
- Inflation
- A general rise in prices over time: every dollar buys less than it did. Small, steady inflation of around 2% is considered healthy; high inflation erodes purchasing power.
- Interest
- The cost of borrowing money. If you borrow 100 at 5% a year, after a year you owe 105. Governments pay interest to whoever holds their debt securities.
- Interest rate
- The percentage applied to money lent, or earned on savings, over a given period. Central banks set benchmark rates to influence the economy.
L
- Legal tender
- Money that by law must be accepted in payment of debts. In the United States, Federal Reserve notes are legal tender. Digital bank money is lawful, but technically it is not legal tender in the same sense.
- Liquidity
- How easily an asset turns into cash. Physical money is perfectly liquid; a house is not — selling it takes time and effort.
M
- Monetary aggregates (M0, M1, M2)
-
Ways of measuring how much money exists in an economy, according to
how liquid it is.
- M0: physical cash only, coins and banknotes.
- M1: cash plus the money in current accounts.
- M2: M1 plus savings accounts and short-term deposits.
- Monetary policy
- A central bank's decisions on the money supply and interest rates, with goals such as keeping inflation in check and supporting employment.
- Money supply
- The total amount of money available in an economy at a given moment. It is measured with the aggregates M0, M1 and M2.
- Mutual help
- The social principle by which people help one another voluntarily, expecting help in return: not as a financial transaction, but as a community practice. It is the foundation of the Club's model.
N
- National debt (public debt)
- The total of what a government owes its creditors, at home and abroad. It grows when the state spends more than it takes in through taxes.
O
- OECD
- Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development: thirty-eight mostly wealthy countries that study and promote growth, trade and social wellbeing. It publishes widely used data on inequality, employment and taxes.
P
- Pension fund
- A pool of money set aside and invested to pay workers' pensions. Pension funds are among the largest buyers of government securities in the world: which means future pensioners are, in effect, among the creditors of the public debt.
- Pilot project
- A small experimental version of a bigger idea, to check whether it works before scaling it up.
- Purchasing power
- The real value of money: what it actually buys. Inflation reduces it over time.
R
- Real economy
- The part of the economy that produces and exchanges actual goods and services — farming, industry, retail, healthcare, education — as distinct from the financial markets.
S
- Speculation
- Buying or trading something mainly to profit from price movements rather than to use it. It can create artificial bubbles and instability.
T
- Tax protest
- The position of those who claim they are not legally obliged to pay taxes. The courts, in the United States and elsewhere, have consistently rejected it.
U
- U.S. Treasuries
- Debt securities issued by the American federal government to raise funds. Considered among the safest investments in the world: whoever buys them lends money to the government and receives interest.
V
- Voucher
- A document or certificate exchangeable for goods, services or a discount. In the Club's model, credits represent the help actually given, not the money spent.
W
- World Inequality Database (WID)
- An academic research project that collects and publishes data on income and wealth inequality around the world. Useful for understanding how wealth is distributed.
Y
- Yellow journalism
- A style of journalism widespread in the United States in the late nineteenth century, which preferred sensational, exaggerated or emotive stories to factual accuracy — often to sell more copies or to serve the owner's interests.
From the theory to the shop counter
The reasoning is worth little if it stays on paper. Here is how it works in practice, and how to join.