So a few years ago I started to think about what money actually is, and realized that no one seemed to question it. Pretty much all political debate revolves around who should be in control of the money, not the money itself. Why do we not question our economic system? Perhaps money is an outdated system?

There have been lots of documentaries and books on how monetary interests corrupt our democracy, how the hunt for profit destroys our environment, or exploits the developing world.

So I wanted to make a film to explore if there was an alternative to this mysterious concept, which controls my life, destroys my planet and exploits people. I went on a journey to look at solutions outside the mainstream debate.

93 year old futurist and social engineer Jacque Fresco’s ideas are central to the film. Future For Sale explores the connection between economy, environment and technology from a futurist perspective. It takes a step away from party politics and conspiracy theories and focuses on solutions outside our ordinary debate.

Today we are acutely aware of the problem posed by the “concept of free” because we’re realising how difficult it is to “monetize” in a world where more and more can be reproduced for free. To sustain value we have to keep products scarce and the demand high, which makes us dependent on systematic waste and unsustainable consumption.

Future For Sale explores the life’s work of Jacque Fresco, which is what he calls a Resource Based Economy. It defends the idea that there are more than enough resources in the world and that you don’t need money to distribute them; what you do need is a completely different use of technology. Effectively, a system that only develops and uses technology when it is for the benefit of all people and the environment.

The idea that technology can and will replace money sounds outrageous but has been around since the beginning of last century. It’s just something that people only seem to think about when the world is in crisis and that is why this film and Jacque’s ideas are relevant today.

Since October 2008 a new activist movement supporting Jacque Fresco’s direction (The Zeitgeist Movement) went from a few hundreds to over 350 000 members world wide. The film gives us a look at the world from a different, playful perspective, where the characters, who first sound either mad or utopian, have something very valuable to offer.

The journey is a structural device, but more importantly a mental journey that allows both my character and the audience to see possibilities in the advancement of modern society, rather than focusing on the problems it has created.

Having done this journey, I am convinced we have the global capacity to live a far richer life, emotionally and practically, and I think we will have to update our economic system whether we want to or not.

MB

Future for Sale is in postproduction and released in 2010.

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Anything else we should join? I’m sure there are plenty. Suggestions & embedding welcome! Happy if you want to set links on various relevant forums or blogs.

Our edit is progressing well, if slowly – but it has to be just right, as you will understand. We’re hoping to release a few small teasers for your enjoyment soon. If you haven’t yet seen our recent video with Danny & the Venus Project Taxi, you can view it here (until I work out how to reinstate the embed function in WP!):

Future For Sale: The Venus Project Taxi

Thanks a lot for all your support already. Keep in touch.   Sonja

We look forward to working with Zeitgeist Movement members in the promotion and distribution of Future For Sale and to test screenings before finalising our cut.

If you haven’t already, please sign up to our mailing list on the right to hear more details about Copenhagen and other forthcoming test screenings.

If you catch the taxi, you can spend your journey reading up about the aims of the Venus Project.

The talk will be a week after a visit to The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, School of Architecture in Copenhagen. (September 26th, Time: 02.10 pm- 04.50 pm No admission fee. Contact information Ida ida.suhr@welovepeople.dk)

Also check out The Venus Project Design – a new non-profit organisation based in the UK which aims to collaborate with The Venus Project by recruiting volunteer architects, engineers, animators and scientists interested in the aims of the resourced based economy and by registering them into a global database.

Future For Sale is continuing to document this progress as well as another exciting energy solution development in Sweden. We’re aiming to finish the film by the end of the year.  Thanks for all who have (patiently!) supported us so far!

Richard is member of the US basic income guarantee network and you can also read a recent article on “Bailout for the People” here.

On that note, look at this pie chart comparing the recent US bail out vs other big government spending, courtesy of voltagecreative.com – perhaps a basic income guarantee is affordable after all?

But we also have examples that are highly topical and much harder to understand. In the financial crisis we see today, lots of people must have signed lots of papers and now can’t fulfill their responsibility. An unbelievable amount of money won’t reach its destination, or the amount just isn’t enough for some reason. Of course most of the agreements concerning the failed investments with high profit margins are covered up so it’s not a crime, even though morally most of us think that it is a crime, especially when some of those responsible get very high salaries, big bonuses, golden parachutes and a pension that could feed an ordinary family for generations. And these ordinary families whose work is what our economy is based on – real work, production and services – are now seeing their pension go down the drain. Is that freedom?

Sure… voters used their free will to vote for politicians who are now bailing out the banks. That’s called democracy. Democracy is supposed to be freedom but I’m 100% positive that if the same voters could vote for or against a bailout, the outcome would be not to bailout. So how does the freedom work where decisions are made on the highest level in our society? Is this what is called democracy?

Another perennial hot issue is poverty and starvation. Based on a United Nations report released in 2003 and reported by BBC News, about 25,000 people die each day from starvation. This was before the current food crisis. Why don’t we bail them out? Because it’s in another nation, another part in the world? Or is it because we, the rich countries, exploited their land, forests and water and made it worthless for growing crops? I wonder how starving people interpret the word freedom. One thing is totally clear for me: The freedom one can have is vastly different, depending on who you are and what you do. I’m amazed how much effort we put in to maintain a very bad system.

But on the other hand… we have made the system so complex that if you’re in it, trying to look at it, you will find no end to the complexity.

Let’s try to make it easier! We, the humans have a lot of needs. If we have money we can satisfy most of our needs since we use money to buy products and services. We all know now how money can lose its value very quickly. When that happens we need more money in order to maintain the previous standard of living. To maintain the money system itself, we also need money – actually an enormous amount of it. But how true is this? And if you believe it’s true – how good is it? What makes it good – our living standard? Money in the bank can’t help you. It seems as we actually believe that money can do things.

Put any amount of money on a table and ask it to do something for you. Nothing will happen.

Any product or service is made by hands, minds and materials. They are the real resources. We don’t need money – we need people. By looking at our system that way we realise that people are the real resources, including the unemployed. Today we let them be a burden instead. How clever is that? What we need is to organise those resources. That’s exactly what capitalism has done, too. The thing is that it’s so badly organised that too many people just work to administrate or invest money.  If we see people as productive forces instead, working to improve our livelihoods  – would that be freedom?

Organisations or charities fundraise on a daily basis in order to help in different areas. It tells me some important things. 1: There are needs to be met. 2: Some have a lot, and some have so much less that they need help.

But most of all it tells me that our system has failed to be good and just. The solution is not to pump in new money to bailout and maintain a bad system. The solution is to redesign it and with it our mind set.

Guest Blogger: junivers

When we started to develop this film in  2007, we didn’t know the extent of the financial collapse which was going to happen around the world, although for anyone following the news you knew something big was brewing.

We’re working hard to complete the film this year, so please watch this space.

Sonja

Richard C. Cook is a former U.S. federal government analyst, whose career included service with the U.S. Civil Service Commission, the Food and Drug Administration, the Carter White House, NASA, and the U.S. Treasury Department. His articles on economics, politics, and space policy have appeared in numerous websites and print magazines. His book on monetary reform, entitled We Hold These Truths: The Hope of Monetary Reform, will soon be published. He is the author of Challenger Revealed: An Insider’s Account of How the Reagan Administration Caused the Greatest Tragedy of the Space Age.