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Why Bitcoin is not a socialist’s ally

yanisvaroufakis.eu

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Re: Why Bitcoin is not a socialist’s ally

#3

Post by ogogmad »

> Under the gold and silver standards, the public money supply was fixed – and could not be easily manipulated by the state (either the government or the, then non-existent, Fed). But that did not stop private bankers from leveraging public money out of thin air to create huge quantities of private money with which to fund the Robber Barons, i.e. the Jeff Bezoses, of the era.

But didn't the creation of private money happen because gold was so expensive to hold and transport? Assuming Layer 2 solutions like Lightning get off the ground, Bitcoin won't have this problem, right?

Re: Why Bitcoin is not a socialist’s ally

#4

Post by sudosysgen »

ogogmad wrote: post #3

> Under the gold and silver standards, the public money supply was fixed – and could not be easily manipulated by the state (either the government or the, then non-existent, Fed). But that did not stop private bankers from leveraging public money out of thin air to create huge quantities of private money with which to fund the Robber Barons, i.e. the Jeff Bezoses, of the era. But didn't the creation of private money…

Not really.

The gold/silver standard refers to the monetary system where paper cash is backed by precious metals, for which it can be exchanged any time.

It does not refer to literally buying things with gold.

So yes, Bitcoin has all the same issues as a gold-backed currency (a gold standard).

Private forms of money were created in order to help alleviate the extreme inelasticity of gold-backed currencies, which the US abandoned in 1971. So Bitcoin would have all the issues of the dollar from 1944 to 1971.

Re: Why Bitcoin is not a socialist’s ally

#7

Post by kerkeslager »

ogogmad wrote: post #3

> Under the gold and silver standards, the public money supply was fixed – and could not be easily manipulated by the state (either the government or the, then non-existent, Fed). But that did not stop private bankers from leveraging public money out of thin air to create huge quantities of private money with which to fund the Robber Barons, i.e. the Jeff Bezoses, of the era. But didn't the creation of private money…

Lightning has nothing to do with holding and transporting Bitcoin. Holding Bitcoin is literally free. Transporting Bitcoin can also be free, depending on what you mean by transporting.

Re: Why Bitcoin is not a socialist’s ally

#8

Post by yalogin »

For me Bitcoin further exacerbates the already terrible distribution of wealth in our world. BTC is purely a play for the "rich" folks. I say "rich" because it needs not just tech access and disposable money barriers but also has the additional tech knowledge barrier to it.

Re: Why Bitcoin is not a socialist’s ally

#9

Post by joosters »

Normally, a big problem in crypto-currency blog posts is that an ill-informed author blathers on about supposed technical features of blockchains.

But this article is remarkable in that it doesn't mention any feature or property of bitcoin at all! You could replace the word 'bitcoin' in the page with any other currency, monetary system or whatever means of accounting that you like (using shells for currency, perhaps?), and nothing would change. The article is amazingly content-free, and its arguments & propositions could be re-applied to whatever you like/dislike!

Re: Why Bitcoin is not a socialist’s ally

#10

Post by sudosysgen »

H8crilA wrote: post #6
heidegger wrote: post #5

all socialists snicker at the mention of bitcoin. it is a punchline, a jab at "Libertarians" and their silly faith in technological solutions to social problems

Yeah, if only more people knew some history: https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/

This is a correlation without causation. The root cause of both fiat currency and the worker being ripped off, is globalization.

Fiat currency did not cause the disconnect between productivity and wages, the same way that the disconnect between productivity and wages did not cause fiat currency. They were both caused by the shift to a complex global economy.

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