Oxidative: Use it or loose it...

Oxidative Money: A New Tool to Balance the Economy of the Future

By: Rodrigo Lañado C.

(As explored in the book The Second Renaissance, published in April 2025)

In The Second Renaissance (published in April 2025), we explore a series of economic concepts designed to serve the communities of the future especially self-sufficient eco-villages and the broader model of the Ecosocial Regenerative System (S.E.R.).

One of the most disruptive and fundamental concepts introduced in the book is Oxidative Money.

This concept redefines the function of money not as an object for unlimited accumulation, but as a living, dynamic tool, aligned with the natural movement of a regenerative economy.

What is Oxidative Money?

Oxidative Money is a form of currency that loses value over time if it is not used.

It is the economic equivalent of fresh food:

• if you use it, it nourishes;

• if you store it indefinitely, it spoils.

The book describes it as:

“A form of money that imitates the natural behavior of life: nothing stagnant thrives. What does not circulate, degrades.”

Oxidative Money introduces a natural rate of deterioration, which forces money to stay in motion within the community.

What is this model used for?

Oxidative Money elegantly solves three fundamental problems of today’s economic systems:

1. It prevents unproductive accumulation

Traditional money rewards those who hoard it, not those who use it.

This produces:

• stagnation,

• inequality,

• speculative bubbles,

• and excessive power in the hands of those who withhold liquidity.

Oxidative Money flips the table:

Saving without using = losing value

Circulating, investing, and producing = maintaining value

This incentivizes real economic activity, not speculation.

2. It stimulates the local economy

In eco-villages, regenerative settlements, or community systems, resource flow is vital.

Oxidative Money ensures that resources:

• circulate,

• are exchanged,

• generate work,

• support projects,

• and strengthen the social fabric.

It is money that behaves like water:

if it does not flow, it stagnates and everything rots.

3. It reduces crises and cycles of artificial scarcity

Many economic crises do not arise from a lack of resources, but from a lack of monetary circulation.

Oxidative Money ensures that:

• the flow never stops,

• the community does not suffer frozen periods,

• and wealth remains alive rather than dead in inactive accounts.

What does this model imitate? Nature itself

The philosophical foundation is clear:

“In nature, everything that stops flowing rots.

Only what moves remains alive.”

Oxidative Money imitates:

• the flow of water,

• the nutrient cycle,

• the respiration of an ecosystem,

• ecological succession.

There is no “tree that hoards oxygen for itself.”

Everything circulates. Everything serves life.

How does Oxidative Money work technically?

The logic is simple:

1. Each unit of money has an oxidation rate (for example, 1–6% per month).

2. If the money remains inactive, it loses that percentage.

3. If it is used, exchanged, invested, or reintegrated into the system, it does not lose value.

4. The oxidized portion can be redirected to:

   
   

   • community funds,

   • infrastructure maintenance,

   • regenerative projects,

   • or incentives for those who contribute to the common good.

   
   

It is a form of currency that demands action, not accumulation.

Is it a completely new idea?

It draws inspiration from:

• the demurrage proposed by Silvio Gesell,

• the oxidizing currencies of Wörgl, Austria (1932),

• certain proto-regenerative models of the 20th century.

But in The Second Renaissance, we give it a more modern, complete, and dynamic form:

• integrated with AI,

• public administration automation,

• a new universal value formula: the CPR (Regenerative Primary Cost),

• blockchain systems for auditability, traceability, impartiality, and dynamism.

It is not a simple experiment;

it is a structural pillar for self-sufficient communities.

Why is it essential for the S.E.R.?

The Ecosocial Regenerative System is based on:

• self-sufficiency,

• energetic flow,

• social stability,

• collaboration,

• and harmony with natural laws.

Oxidative Money supports all of these because it breaks parasitic accumulation.

It allows each economic unit to circulate like a nutrient in a forest.

It helps prevent:

• monopolies,

• stagnation,

• concentration of power,

• artificial poverty,

• and external dependency.

In a world entering ecological, social, and economic collapse, Oxidative Money represents a profound shift:

A form of money that serves life, not accumulation.

A money that circulates, not dominates.

A money that oxidizes if it is not shared—

as a reminder that life moves, transforms,

and regenerates only through flow.

This is why The Second Renaissance proposes Oxidative Money as an essential element of the economies of the future and of the S.E.R. where communities do not merely survive, but thrive through living, just, and regenerative systems.