Time as a Repository for Intangible Value

Why is it confusing to determine how human capital contributes to wealth creation? Not only is today's intangible wealth difficult to measure, so far it's notoriously difficult to translate into a wide range of economic settings as well. Unlike the tangible product of tradable sector wealth - which potentially originates from all corners of the world - intangible value is more closely related to specific human capital outcomes in favored regions. This has put an undue focus on "special" cities and areas to utilize highly concentrated skill sets, with the rest of the world's population seemingly on the back burner, indefinitely.

Intangible value as a partial representation of skill aggregates, has temporarily devalued human potential. Asymmetric skills arbitrage leaves too much human capital out of what could be self regenerating processes for wealth creation. When human capital as product is purposefully separated from production cycles which include human capital as investment, much of its monetary representation accrues to specific income sets, rather than continuous networks of working capital. Ultimately, substantial income becomes caught in passive asset holdings where it is separated from further human capital utilization. More specifically, too many organizational patterns for non tradable sector time based product, aren't allowing human capital utilization to spontaneously self generate. Instead, these patterns - more than anything - contribute to the passive holdings of real estate. One can think of real estate as a sort of final repository for far too much compensated human activity, as a result.

Alas, this circumstance poses real problems for long term economic dynamism. Too much of the aggregate value of GDP is being caught in passive asset holdings, where it sidelines much of what could be complete levels of economic participation. When real estate is allowed to absorb excessive value from current and past skill sets, its passive nature can be likened to layers of sediment in a river, which slows the more active components of our economic lives.

What could be done to address this problem? Time arbitrage could secure additional economic value in what would essentially be constant economic interaction. New time value would be generated, as individuals build life work patterns among networked time groupings which have a legal life not unlike that of corporate structure. Time units as the commodity in common, provide the active wealth building component for services generation. By placing matched time units in a primary market position (mutual employment), the broken connections between human capital utilization and investment would also be repaired.

Equally important: Since time units would hold storage characteristics in common with monetary characteristics, measured time value would make the use of knowledge and skill more tangible. Recorded and otherwise stored time units would function as a repository for economic value, and give human capital a stronger anchor than the passive holdings of real estate. Not only would skills sets and knowledge use be recorded according to actual use in specific instances (rather than skills classifications), the time continuum would allow the torch of knowledge and skills dispersal to be passed from each participant to the next. Since time value would maintain a constant active function, less time value overall would be lost to real estate value as a cost of economic access. And with more economic value retained in knowledge use networks, manufacturers would have additional incentive to create low cost forms of flexible housing components, which would in turn reflect lower group income/transaction costs for services of all kinds.