Passage V

Time Dollars: Earning Help by Giving Help

Across the United States, individuals and community groups are turning their personal time into opportunities to both give and receive volunteer services. By donating their time and talents to others through nonprofit Time Dollar Exchange programs are contributing to their communities and promoting interaction.

Though the practice of bartering have ancient origins, Time Dollars began in 1980 as a means of encouraging and rewarding community involvement. Time Dollar Exchange programs recognize that each person is valuable and has something meaningfully to contribute. One hour spent helping another person earns one Time Dollar. The Time Dollar can then be exchanged for services from another participant. For instance, a person might wash someone's windows for an hour and receive an hour's worth of babysitting from someone else.(68) The Time Dollar is not a conventional unit of currency, such as a dollar or quarter. It is recorded at a clearinghouse that connects volunteers with people needing their services.

Furthermore, a program in Brooklyn, New York, that focuses on services for senior citizens is one of the longest-running projects, since 1987, more than 5,000 participants have tallied up 115,000 Time Dollars. Service opportunities range between home repair and meal preparation; to ride sharing and reading aloud. The beauty of the program is that, because those who receive help provide assistance to others in return, the program fosters mutual relationships. Many participants claim that the Brooklyn program has created a network for otherwise-isolated seniors. (73)

Participating in this increasingly popular system of fair exchange has its rewards. Today there are more than sixty Time Dollar programs operating in twenty-five states. Participants gain a strengthened sense of neighborhood and community. First, neighbors are getting to know neighbors, and teenagers have gotten involved. Through Time Dollars, those with specific needs are meeting them with the cooperation of others.