Absolutely, in most parts of the world, these days. Essentially, it comes down to two things -- what are taxes paid in (they don't want a 10th of your apples o

Absolutely, in most parts of the world, these days. Essentially, it comes down to two things -- what are taxes paid in (they don't want a 10th of your apples or cattle these days) and what final settlement is enforced by law in contract disputes. Even if you have a contract stating I owe you 4 pork bellies or chunks of gold or bitcoins, if we end up in a court of law, they'll only enforce settlement in currency. So yeah this comes as no surprise. People can (depending on jurisdiction and subject to details and scale and taxability etc) by and large "barter" in other media of exchange all they want, especially on a small peer-to-peer scale. Just don't expect too much legal protection / contract enforcement in anything other than legal tender. ;)