Comments on: Barter: Your Economy Depends On It

By: mariasinclaire

mariasinclaire — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 16:17:04 +0000

Great Post!

Ormita has a website with the history of barter on it which I found interesting – http://www.ormita.com/history-of-barter.html

I saw a timeline that they also published on money and barter but I cannot find it any more. Either way we have considered using them because they seem to know a bit about bartering.

The risks I see with barter exchanges are:
inflation (exchange owners spending barter dollars they dont have)
the wrong mix of members (everyone wanting my product/service but me having nothing to buy)
poor credit control (creating more inflation)

the only reason I liked the Ormita guys was that they let me join and trade but didnt let me sell until I had things to buy. I had ot fill out a buying schedule of everything I currently spent cash on and then they went away and 30 days later they came back with those things and THEN i started buying and selling. The risks seemed lower to me.

I flirted with ITEX and other barter systems but i always ended up selling more than I could ever buy. Like I said – barter can be useful but watch out. I think Ormita don’t consider themselves a “barter” system as such – but more an excess capacity exchange or commodity exchange or something. I heard the sales pitch and the difference was a little outside my scope but maybe its just that the trades take place in a relatively short time (both buy and sell) so Im always close to $0 in my account because i spend everything I earn? Anyway if someone has a copy of their “timeline” of barter I’d be interested in getting one. I know I saw it somewhere on the web from Ormita but I cant seem to locate it again. It would be useful to take another look at.

By: bellissima7

bellissima7 — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 17:12:25 +0000

check out http://www.favorpals.com to do all your bartering of services. it is an easy site to navigate through and completely safe and secure.

By: Best Personal Finance Reads of March 2009 | StupidCents

Best Personal Finance Reads of March 2009 | StupidCents — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 01:10:34 +0000

[...] Weakonomist @ Weakonomics writes about simple ways that everyone get by in a tough economy. Bartering may be old fashioned, but it doesn’t hurt to put a new age twist on it! 30% [...]

By: Reintroducing Bartering : Domestic Cents

Reintroducing Bartering : Domestic Cents — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 07:15:45 +0000

[...] my bartering. This week the topic was mentioned twice that I noticed at Free Money Finance and at Weakonomics. Then, a bread customer of mine asked me if I’d be willing to barter with them a few days [...]

By: E.C.

E.C. — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 21:23:57 +0000

Unfortunately, babysitting is nowhere near that easy in most cases. The last time I babysat, over a year and a half ago, it was for a two year old and a five year old. In addition to cooking dinner, changing the two year old’s diapers, and keeping the kiddos from getting a hold of the pocket knife and cigarette lighter their father had been thoughtful enough to leave in easy reach on the coffee table, I had to deal with multiple screaming tantrums from the five year old, who was furious that, among other things, I wouldn’t let her cheat at Candyland and refused to let her go exploring the shady apartment complex’s parking lot after dark. She kept trying to escape and run away to go play outside by herself so I had to watch her like a hawk.

Ultimately, the mother wrote me a check that came to less than $5/hour. If I ever babysit again, I’m negotiating my fees in advance!

By: jason

jason — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 16:02:21 +0000

I know someone who does estate sales and receives first dibs on the items to be sold instead of getting paid. I like that more people are exchanging goods and services. Could always trade web design for seo help….

By: the weakonomist

the weakonomist — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 02:17:14 +0000

@JC that’s right you can pet sit. My fiance did that for some lawyer friends as they traveled last year. They paid $100 a day to check on their two dogs!

By: stewardshipjourney

stewardshipjourney — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 23:25:07 +0000

Amen. Nothing like a good old fashioned exchange of goods and services. If only I had some useful skills to offer into this world . Thanks for the great post, and remind me never to get you to babysit my kids, knowing that they’d be running around screaming naked while you sit and check your blog stats!

By: Betsy Bargain

Betsy Bargain — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 21:55:52 +0000

Great post. I’m a firm believer in the power of barter. I wrote a post on it myself back in January. These days when everyone’s broke, bartering could help keep our economic world going ’round.

By: Broke Wall Streeter

Broke Wall Streeter — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 20:25:53 +0000

Matt, forget the tax on bartering. The U.S. Gov’t is missing out on taxing $50 billion a year if they made online poker or sportsbetting legal. Right now it’s going fully untaxed to the local bookies or offshore books, poker rooms, and casinos.

Anyway, I bring books into work that don’t sell on eBay or Amazon after a year. someone gets a free book and I get a writeoff.