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Lets say if I want my house painted. I have some certificates for labor. One laborer paints my house in 10 hours, and another paints my house in 20 hours. It is not possible for the labor to be valued the same, because the work gets done in half the time with first laborer than the second.
Also, I have a wallet full of labor certificates. If I want some work done, it would be a mess to collect the right certificates. I need 10 hours worth of labor from the faster painter to paint my house. If I only have four, I have to hunt around until I have traded to get 10 hours of the painter's labor certificates in my hand. If I have labor certificates from the slower painter, people aren't going to accept them in equal exchange, because they aren't equal.
Of course, all this has nothing to do with whether authors should get paid. If authors shouldn't be paid, then why should they paid in timebank script?
A timebank can work only at the margins, as a supplement at best to traditional money. They could work for fungible services, an hour of babysitting might be more or less the same as any othe hour of babysitting.
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