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Cryptocurrencies’ Carbon Footprint Underestimated

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Re: Cryptocurrencies’ Carbon Footprint Underestimated

#171

Post by lalaland1125 »

foepys wrote: post #57
cwkoss wrote: post #19

The idea of taxing cryptocurrencies specifically for carbon emissions is some mixture of naive, shallow and sour grapes. There are a lot of wasteful industries - crypto is a small slice of the overall pie and is arguably the most responsive to market forces. Make universally applied carbon taxes across all industries and let the market sort it out. I'm a crypto bull, and fully support greening our energy economy. Adv…

The problem with this is that poor people will not be able to keep their fridge powered if energy became too expensive.

Every carbon tax proposal includes a section that redistributes the money to the people (with poor people getting more of that redistributed money).

Re: Cryptocurrencies’ Carbon Footprint Underestimated

#172

Post by lottin »

nolantait wrote: post #6
endisneigh wrote: post #3

There's some good data here - that being said, even if the carbon footprint were literally zero, I couldn't personally support cryptocurrency. Fundamentally it's the antithesis to democracy. Say whatever you will about all forms of government, but ultimately no matter the form, there's some level of accountability. Some governments use elections to facilitate this, others use the threat of rulers being killed. One wa…

What about the idea that it acts as a balancing weight to the perverse incentives for countries to debase their currency? Radically if the relationship to taxation was more of a voluntary customer relationship it could lead to better outcomes, ignoring how many more problems it might bring. Thoughts?

What incentives do countries have to debase their currency in your opinion?

Re: Cryptocurrencies’ Carbon Footprint Underestimated

#173

Post by mavhc »

anonporridge wrote: post #87
foepys wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with this is that poor people will not be able to keep their fridge powered if energy became too expensive.

Could the solution be graduated luxury carbon taxes on unnecessary consumption, like private jets, regular flights, non critical home AC, Christmas lights, PC gaming, etc?

Just tax everything the amount it costs to clean up the pollution it causes, and then use that money to clean up the pollution.

Subsidize the poor as we've always done.

Re: Cryptocurrencies’ Carbon Footprint Underestimated

#174

Post by MrPatan »

NoGravitas wrote: post #4
xrd wrote: post #2

I still think war and oil are dirtier and don't see a way to wean ourselves off that consumption and impact. I do see that cryptocurrencies are moving toward energy reduction through things like proof of stake and L2s. https://susanfsu.medium.com/think-btc-is-a-dirty-business-co...

HERE IS THE ARTICLE YOU CAN SEND TO PEOPLE WHEN THEY SAY “BUT THE ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES WITH CRYPTOART WILL BE SOLVED SOON, RIGHT?” https://everestpipkin.medium.com/but-the-environmental-issue... The promise of "proof of stake eventually" is just greenwashing.

I wonder what will be the excuse to hate it after Ethereum does move to PoS.

The reason to hate it is clear: Not having any. The excuse to hate it will have to change though.

What will it be? There's always "inequality", I guess, but that is a bit too transparent and lets us see through to the actual reason.

I guess we will find out, exciting times for the angry blog post market!

Re: Cryptocurrencies’ Carbon Footprint Underestimated

#175

Post by MelonTree »

endisneigh wrote: post #3

There's some good data here - that being said, even if the carbon footprint were literally zero, I couldn't personally support cryptocurrency. Fundamentally it's the antithesis to democracy. Say whatever you will about all forms of government, but ultimately no matter the form, there's some level of accountability. Some governments use elections to facilitate this, others use the threat of rulers being killed. One wa…

100 years ago, you would've used the same argument to try ban cars. They're fundamentally antithetical to democracy, as they allow anyone to .. commit crimes and get away with it.

Re: Cryptocurrencies’ Carbon Footprint Underestimated

#176

Post by reedjosh »

endisneigh wrote: post #137
reedjosh wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Inflation generally hurts the middle-class the most. The middle class typically has a mortgage and student loan debt for which inflation benefits them. The closer you are to the spiket, the more debt based inflation benefits you. The poor do lose the most.

You're not wrong, the the middle class has far more savings than the poorest quartile. Is it this you disagree with?

I disagree that the middle class is hurt the most.

Whoever can leverage the most debt for assets benefits the most under an inflationary scheme. This tends to be banks and generally wealthy people.

Stated inversly the poorest are hurt the most as they are least a part of this wealth generating scheme.

Cash savings is largely irrelevant. Most Americans are net negative cash wise via credit cards. So stating the middle class is most hurt doesn't follow logically.

I'm basically middle class, but to keep a substantial cash savings would be financial idiocy in this inflationary system.

Re: Cryptocurrencies’ Carbon Footprint Underestimated

#177

Post by hackingforfun »

shkkmo wrote: post #115
chroem- wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Fundamentally it's the antithesis to democracy. What is this even supposed to mean? Strict state controls on economic activity are more within the realm of authoritarian regimes, rather than democracies.

Democracies depends on transparency, accountability and the rule of law. Cyrptocurrencies are fundementally more anarchic than democratic.

Public blockchains have way more transparency than existing systems. Please provide an example of an existing democracy you consider to be more transparent, i.e. every single action that is made is public.

Re: Cryptocurrencies’ Carbon Footprint Underestimated

#179

Post by mavhc »

tornato7 wrote: post #65
NoGravitas wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How long has Etherium been "planning" to move to PoS? How widely used are other PoS systems? Even beyond that, a PoS system is still, like all cryptocurrencies, functionally, a pyramid scheme.

Ethereum has been planning to move to PoS since the beginning. PoS is already working and devs are making incredible progress toward The Merge. PoS chains such as Solana and more efficient L2s are already starting to see wide adoption.

How does Proof of Stake not cause the rich to grow richer?

Re: Cryptocurrencies’ Carbon Footprint Underestimated

#180

Post by pshc »

xadhominemx wrote: post #150
trts wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bitcoin at least was a deliberate response to what I would paraphrase as the "socialism for the rich, capitalism for the rest" policies of the last global financial crisis. I'm not going to say it will be successful in that aim, but the idea that governments can simply create currency by fiat, donate it to their powerful, insolvent friends, pass the cost along to your grandchildren and/or degrade the value of your sa…

> Bitcoin at least was a deliberate response to what I would paraphrase as the "socialism for the rich, capitalism for the rest" policies of the last global financial crisis. Was it actually, though?

Ostensibly, yes, with the genesis block containing the string "The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks"
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