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LABOUR EXCHANGE

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Originally appearing in Volume V16, Page 7 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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LABOUR See also:

EXCHANGE , a See also:term very frequently applied to registries having for their See also:principal See also:object the better See also:distribution of labour (see See also:UNEMPLOYMENT). Historically the term is applied to the See also:system of equitable labour exchanges established in See also:England between 1832 and 1834 by See also:Robert See also:Owen and his followers. The See also:idea is said to have originated with See also:Josiah See also:Warren, who communicated it to Owen. Warren tried an experiment in 1828 at See also:Cincinnati, opening an exchange under the See also:title of a " See also:time See also:store." He joined in starting another at Tuscarawas, See also:Ohio, and a third at See also:Mount See also:Vernon, See also:Indiana, but none were quite on the same See also:line as the See also:English exchanges. The fundamental idea of the English exchanges was to establish a currency based upon labour; Owen in The Crisis for See also:June 1832 laid down that all See also:wealth proceeded from labour and knowledge; that labour and knowledge were generally remunerated according to the time employed, and that in the nets exchanges it was proposed to make time the See also:standard or measure of wealth. This new currency was represented by " labour notes," the notes being measured in See also:hours, and the See also:hour reckoned as being See also:worth sixpence, this figure being taken as the mean between the wage of the best and the worst paid labour. Goods were then to be exchanged for the new currency. The exchange was opened in extensive premises in the See also:Gray's See also:Inn Road, near See also:King's See also:Cross, See also:London, on the 3rd of See also:September 1832. For some months the See also:establishment met with considerable success, and a consider-able number of tradesmen agreed to take labour notes in See also:payment for their goods. At first, an enormous number of deposits was made, amounting in seventeen See also:weeks to 445,501 hours. But difficulties soon arose from the lack of See also:sound See also:practical valuators, and from the inability of the promoters to distinguish between the labour of the highly skilled and that of the unskilled. Trades-men, too, were See also:quick to see that the exchange might be worked to their See also:advantage; they brought unsaleable stock from their shops, exchanged it for labour notes, and then picked out the best of the saleable articles.

Consequently the labour notes began to depreciate; trouble also arose with the proprietors of the premises, and the experiment came to an untimely end See also:

early in 1834. See F. Podmore's Robert Owen, ii. c. xvii. (1906); B. See also:Jones, Co-operative See also:Production, c. viii. (1894) ; G. J. See also:Holyoake, See also:History of Co-operation, c. viii. (1906).

End of Article: LABOUR EXCHANGE

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