A Liberatory Approach to Pay*: A Case Study in Needs-based Money Distribution Part 2

Introduction

In Part 1, we outlined a radical experiment run by two leading-edge organizations – Greaterthan (GT) and Nonviolent Global Liberation (NGL) – to reimagine how colleagues distribute resources.

Grounded in principles of transparency, mutual care and nonviolence, the six-month experiment – exploring money distribution based on needs rather than work done – has now concluded.

The team recorded a “fishbowl” conversation to share their personal experiences:

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The teams involved – those within the experiment, those facilitating it, and those coaching – have gathered to observe and capture insights, along with real quotes from participants in italics, about adopting this liberatory practice:

I. Individual Experience & Capacity Building

‍Money vulnerability. Watching colleagues share intimate details of their financial lives was both brave and transformative. The team made it clear: this isn’t for everyone, especially given how we’re conditioned to hide our money habits. Seeing others’ financial reality so clearly gave a sense not only of what it looks like to live a certain life, but also what it feels like to have those stresses or freedoms, and what it means to share it with others.

• ‍“I was feeling anxious and nervous about what I need. I have a story of ‘that’s my problem, not yours.’”
• “It’s baring your financial soul – how comfortable you are with savings and debt and the things you buy.”
• “We are discussing the non-discussables, moving into the unspeakable things. Even more charged because it’s money, livelihood, value in this capitalist system.” ‍

The story behind the numbers. Participants felt a strong desire to explain what’s happening in their life beyond the numbers. At the same time, even if it can’t be perfectly explained, they were challenged to sense that people know them and trust and care for them. We’re talking about numbers, but we’re not really talking about numbers.

• ‍“Sometimes money is all I can think about. I’m trying to solve this, thinking I should be working harder.”
• “The ways I was paid before had rules that were either opaque or just meant we didn’t have to interact at a human level. This practice showed me how much rules can be replaced with care and interaction.” ‍

Varying financial literacy and liberation. Each person had different ways they approached their finances before this: one had a detailed spreadsheet to the penny, while for another this was new and a rough estimate. The numbers had so much information behind them – differences in countries, currencies – that at first could look extreme and uneven. It took time to speak the same language and get to a level of comfort and communication.

• “I’m not liberated from the old system, because of the benefits it’s given me. I don’t have enough trust in the universe, or in my fellow human beings, that I would be taken care of without accumulating.”
• “If the others are open to give, I trust their discernment. My level of opening is tied to their level of giving me more. This is in the stretch zone, but I trust that the others are giving it wholeheartedly.” ‍

It’s about noticing, not distributing or feeling great. There was often not enough money in the pot to meet all needs, which led to hard choices and conversations. Finding a distribution that attends to needs was not about nailing a perfect formula that can be duplicated month after month. Instead, what became more important was noticing, adjusting and finding principles that work for the group. The conversations did not always feel great, as each person stretched beyond their comfort – sometimes to share the impacts of this money in their life, sometimes to receive more, sometimes to receive less – yet the group felt the value of discussing and discerning together how needs would be met.‍

• "The question of what is a ‘need’ vs. a ‘want’ came up at first. That question doesn’t come up anymore. It’s just being in regular practice of: how does this feel? The old story that only certain things are valid needs and the rest are frivolous wants – that really dissipated.”
• “This feels less like distributing money, more like distributing discomfort.”
• “The needs distribution never felt good. I never left going ‘Whoohoo! Now I feel great!’ It felt important to do, and worth it, but it was heavy most of the time.”‍
• While coaching the group, Miki Kashtan shared: “the point is to build capacity, not invent a better distribution method.”

II. Group Dynamics & Relational Practice

‍What happens to work when payment is separate. One of the tenets of this experiment was separating money allocation from work recognition and performance, to get out of models of reward or punishment, and to connect with their work and their client’s needs. This was not always easy. First, all needs were not always met through the distribution itself. Still, the team was able to focus on the work while experimenting with a new money model. For a team member who was more money-stressed and received more than usual, it opened up space. For another who received less than usual, it brought up questions of worth and value.

• ‍“I don’t feel like my capacity to focus on the work was impacted by this experiment – which is a good thing. It didn’t make me any less committed or present for the client.”
• “If I have to find another job, it’s such a mental pull away. The shared abundance makes it easier to keep my eye on the ball in the client space. I am more available. I’m noticing an increase in my inner flexibility for what might be possible for our client.”
• “If I actually get zero from this team, will I even be motivated to work this month? I am used to tying accomplishment and value with how much money I receive.”

‍Emergence of care over judgment. At first, as facilitators, we worried that seeing and discussing each other’s expenses and needs would lead to judgment (“why are you spending money on X?”) or pity (“you poor thing, we should really help you out”). Instead, questions emerged from a place of genuine concern, honoring each person’s needs and dignity. Even further, team members asked questions that added money to other people’s totals (like “I didn’t see Y on your list, shouldn’t that also be here?”). And the effects of that care were felt.‍

• ‍“I’ve been carrying this financial stress for years, it now feels so good to have you all carrying it with me… It made me love you more. The way you took care of me.”
• “On a smaller collective scale of the three of us, this brought us so much closer. There’s so much more I know about what’s going on with you. It’s improved my participation in and sensing of our collective.”
• “I’ve enjoyed accumulation and what it makes possible in my life now… but how would a future world be joyful if everyone is living in sufficiency?” ‍

Building a collective muscle. Before this experiment, the team from Greaterthan already had the “Happy Money Story” – a collective practice to distribute money in a way that feels good. This experiment gave them an even deeper layer to consider and care for each other’s needs. Building this visibility – and the muscle to look at it together – is something they plan to take into their future teams, ventures, and projects.‍

• ‍“There were massive impacts that we didn’t have insight into before. At first, it was confronting. Over time, we built the capacity to look at it together. That was a big shift.”
• “If I were to be plugged into this sort of business model or environment again, I would look to this form of transparency and this practice as a really important place to be exploring.”
• “The specificity is important to share. Also to make more transparent the consequences – what happens if we don’t get our needs met. That visibility has felt important. Hiding it away preserves comfort but increases separation.”

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III. Systemic Implications

Showing the gaps vs. today’s systems. The experiment made it clear to all participants just how wide the gap is between these practices and our current social systems – individualist Western capitalist ways of living and working – that lack ways of living in shared risk. ‍

• ‍“This isn’t new. This is ancient. But it’s innovative to a bunch of white folk in the Western world.”
• “Experimenting this way, I really feel what it looks like to resocialize, to hedge in this direction. Then I have to walk over to another field which is hyper-individualistic to satisfy the gaps in the balance sheet.”‍
• “What would a world be like in which the safety net isn’t an emergency measure, but an intentional structure?” shared Miki during a coaching call. ‍

Connection to broader structures. The team questioned how healthy a team or an organization needs to be, to do this type of experiment. As a start, it helped that this particular team already had a deep history and trust from working together for a long time. This rich soil helped them – individually and collectively – be with the discomfort, stories, feelings, or judgments that this experiment often triggered around money.‍

• ‍“The preparatory soil between the three of us was quite rich in terms of our relational field, our individual capacity for liberation work and self reflection, and also capacity to be with discomfort (both our own and those of others), and a willingness to be on edges and a high degree of trust to recognise and yet not stay within judgment.”
• “The only way we can have really good conflict systems, to deal with stories about each other, getting accurate information from the horse’s mouth. That’s a prerequisite to sit in the fire of different judgments, feelings, or money stories around allocation.”
• “There’s a need for this form of transparency in any cooperative or collective endeavor. It could look like an agreement refreshed every six months, to set salaries for a window of time, based on a transparent understanding of needs and class position.” ‍

Class and privilege undercurrents. The experiment highlighted how factors like personal and family history shape our experiences and possibilities with money. The team wondered: does this experiment have to be with people from similar backgrounds? They concluded: no. In fact, those with more privilege found themselves stepping up to alleviate the needs of those at more challenging points in life. ‍

• ‍“We’re from different social class backgrounds. What matters is the person, that I care whether their needs are met. The hypothetical questions are so different from people you’d actually live a life with on a regular basis.”
• “I’ve been very ‘successful’ in the game, accumulated a lot, I have a lot of comfort. Yet I know that just by the happenstance of my birth, my parents, their struggles, their ability to send me to college. None of it happened by itself. All of it happened because there was lack somewhere else.”
• “Instead of guilt or shame, how do I use privilege as one piece of information in decisions? I still feel enormous pressure to put my privilege in service of things.”

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IV. Facilitator & Container Learnings

Hot and cold: holding uneven experience. If we were to put one hand in cold water, the other in hot water, then put them both in warm water, one would experience burning and the other freezing within the same temperature. In the same way, different people are coming into this experiment from different contexts, and some may feel comfortable while others incredibly uncomfortable. The person holding the facilitation function tried to co-create the conditions for the most togetherness to arise while facilitating decisions and stretch based on willingness and capacity.

A balancing act: holding the whole AND individuals. The facilitators needed to help create the conditions in which people find their own empowerment and grow the capacity to ask for what they need, face the consequences of their actions, and learn and grow. Along the same lines, the facilitator may be called to attend to the needs of one of the participants having a particularly challenging time. At the same time, it helps to orient the group to care for the whole.

Safe but limiting: the container. The container design – focusing on one team, one project, one distribution, one month at a time – both supported and inhibited growth. The team felt the safety of the container, but also the limits. They longed for more space for reflection and stories. These learnings will be incorporated into future application projects.‍

• ‍“I feel increasingly frustrated with the constraints. Holding it in the middle got harder and harder: a foot in one world, a foot trying to find a plant in another world. I want the bottom of my foot to have more terrain under it. I want more experimentation in wider circles.”
• “The artificiality of months and project layer was a useful constraint but still confining. I longed for more spaciousness for reflection. Most reflection felt like it was done in the service of making a distribution decision.”
• “A pinch of storytelling would be helpful for distribution. We were opening up to each other, but there was still a quality of storytelling that would come through the cracks. Why not be intentional and let it be an element of the process itself?”
  
  

Broader Implications for Liberatory Practices

This case study is a starting point for ongoing dialogue and practice around liberatory financial practices. While the experiment was conducted within two organizations already committed to transformative approaches, it offers a compelling model for groups already aligned with values of integrity, transparency, trust and responsibility. The process demonstrates that when teams are empowered to discuss and share financial realities openly:

• Payment can be decoupled from performance.
• Vulnerability becomes a strength that fosters deeper connection.
• Collective responsibility can lead to adaptive practices that honor individual needs.

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The experiment conducted by Greaterthan, with guidance from NGL, offers a rich case study in how financial practices can be reimagined to serve not just economic efficiency but also personal wellbeing and community care. By asking the right questions — about the nature of need, the definition of “minimum,” and the role of vulnerability — this project lays the groundwork for broader discussions on transforming our relationship with money and each other. For teams and organizations willing to step outside conventional models, this experiment provides both a practical roadmap and an inspiring vision of what financial liberation might look like.

‍Header photo by  Joan Oger on Unsplash‍