Thank you for your analysis. I found myself agreeing with much of it.

I would however pick up on two points.

Firstly I do not believe that almost every economist believes that money started with barter nor do most of them need barter to be a starting point to argue their points. Their evidence does not hinge on all of the history of money starting with barter.

Secondly debt cancellation is not the panacea you think it is. Most debt is someone else’s Asset. If you cancelled say sovereign debt then most pension funds would collapse creating a huge amount of poverty for exactly the group of people who for the most part managed their money the best. They would collapse as they hold so many bonds. Countries don’t lend each other money like they used to, they borrow it from tomorrow’s pensioners.

If you cancel any debt in the US, say student debt by govt action then the total amount of debt doesn’t change, it simply changes from a student liability to a tax payer liability. That is technically regressive as students usually earn more than the average tax payer.

If you want to reduce debt then you need to do so in an economically coherent proposed fashion.