2017-01-17bloomberg.com

Detroiters like Cassells, after years of privation, have turned to what experts call a gift economy to survive. Theirs is an alternative economy based on time banking, skill-sharing, and giveaways--home-grown vegetables, a roof repair, spare keys to a shared car--in which neighbors give as they can and take as they need.

It's a currency of community that has helped Detroit's poor survive without ready cash. And those who rely on it say it has helped strengthen communities throughout America's poorest big city, where nearly 40 percent of people live in poverty and about 11 percent officially are out of work.

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The city's much-touted renaissance is reviving just seven of its 139 square miles. In the rest, all that many people feel they have are community-based networks of their own making. 



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