Barry Koren, admin

    Hi, I'm Barry Koren and I founded and administer this site.

TimeExchanges enable us to acknowledge one another.

When I help you for an hour, I can debit your account for that hour and credit mine. (A few clicks records the transaction.)

The hour I earned helping you, I can spend by asking someone to help me. The hour you owe you can clear by helping someone. It works the same if my organization helps yours for 40 hours.    

TimeExchanges also enable me to give my loved ones my time as holiday gifts or to donate to an organization I support.

Using time currency feels different than using dollars. When you and I help one another without exchanging dollars, we tend to feel more personally connected to one another.

Exchanging time rather than dollars is more like helping a friend or family member. It puts relationship back in exchanges and gives us options, especially when there isn’t enough money for what is wanted.

But wait, there’s more…
 

TimeExchanges can be used in our Marketplace. You can buy and sell with dollars or hours.

Ads are free. You can let people know what you are looking for. You can also let them know the service you are offering.

TimeExchanges can be used in groups in which you’re involved. You can bring time currency to your church or organization.  

Church members helping one another and recording the transactions can take exchanges among members to a new level. You can use time as if it is money. You can fund programs with time currency and go through a planning process just as might with dollars: plan, budget, implement, evaluate, and adjust your actions.

Group members using time exchanges can be part of a larger network of people using time currency. The larger the network, the more choices in the time exchange market and the more likely you’ll find just what you need and people looking for just what you are offering.
 

BENEFITS OF TIME EXCHANGES

• It keeps dollars in our pockets.
   
• It brings us together, builds optimism, and is sustainable.
   
• It’s especially valuable in urgent situations.

USE TIME AS MONEY

• For gigs and other projects.
   
• To “buy” and “sell.”
   
• To budget, evaluate, and adjust how you spend time.
   

GET MORE. Time exchanges are about connecting, getting closer, and helping one another. They encourage us to find out more about the people near us -- their skills, gifts, challenges, experiences, needs. The more people exchange time helping one another, the more these exchanges foster a simpler way of living and help melt big, daunting problems like poverty, polarization, and environmental pollution.

This combo of people being more connected locally and being able to make natural exchanges that have not been monetized, fosters a closer-knit, more loving community. There are many expressions of this. Jimmy Hendrix said: When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace.

Key People:

▸ Barry Koren, AIA, PhD, founder:
I grew up in Harlem, in New York City, in an apartment above my parents' Mom and Pop grocery store. Many years later, in 2000, I became active in progressive national politics. I've now concluded that the solutions to many of the significant problems we have in the US will come from people talking with and helping one another. This website is a step in that direction.

I became registered as an architect in 1971 and have subsequently worked for large and small architectural firms, a city department of community development, a not-for-profit organization doing grass-roots organizing, and a large corporation. My PhD is from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and focused on the question of why people stay in or move from a racially changing urban neighborhood.

My personal mission is this. By the year 2030 -- when my grandsons will be 22 and 19 years old -- to create a world or place where most people can sit around their kitchen table with loved ones and eat locally grown, wholesome food. And where there are no more garbage trucks because people have become masters of unwasting.

For me, this website is a step in carrying out this vision.  If you want to explore for yourself this kitchen-table stuff, there are lots of links on the Green Lifestyles - Building Family & Community Resilience page. 

▸ Felice Bassuk.
Felice is a screenwriter and film producer and Barry's life-time partner. She's been in on this site before it was even a glimmer of a possibility. She's our chief editor and Barry's confidant. Without Felice's support, this website would not be possible.

▸ Bhuv Sharma
Bhuv has been working with us on our website since 2014 and has done fabulous work in helping us evolve the site. He does all of the changes on our Drupal database. (Drupal is open source software that itself continuously updates.) Bhuv is the wizard that who helps keep our website ticking away. 

▸ Lisa Kayser.
Lisa has put the meat on the bones for the website. She seeds the website with links, images, videos, blogs, classifieds, and Q&A. And she has made the website as user-friendly as it is. For example, she along, with her very able assistants -- Zach and Bryce Kayser -- have put together the kids' page and uploaded engaging photos.

▸ Viktor Denischik.
Viktor is the artistic, technological guru behind the website. Viktor has helped us move this site way beyond the original concept. He has built the structure of the website and it's face. He's our chief explorer, finding and implementing new features and new ways we can expand the site. And whenever we're stuck, he finds the way out and moves us ahead.

▸ Lynne S. Williams.
Lynne is the long-time, very smart, very creative associate of Barry's who helped him develop and launch the initial concept for the website. She and Barry designed the original logo for the site.

▸ Emory Mead.
Emory is an artist in every crevice of his soul and the very talented artist who did the graphic design for the website.