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Re:Bitcoin Technology Piques Interest on Wall Street by 1971genocide on Saturday August 29, 2015 @02:17PM (#10140860)
Bitcoin's underlying problem as a monetary system is the same that exists with commodity based currencies like gold.

Almost all economical models that exists out there always reach a point of indeterminacy. What happens when there is massive inequality in the bitcoin world ?

Money has one important purpose :

1) Efficient allocation of labor for society's benefit.

To achieve it we need to establish something that can be used as a source of value.

Bitcoin solves the problem of source of value but we know from history that it doesn't always solve the problem of efficient labor productivity.

Since by definition society requires centralization to direct its purpose. FDR during the great depression had the same problem of a lot of people having liquidity with no need to direct it for labor productivity.

If we lived in a bitcoin world it would be impossible for governments to mobilize itself to direct resources to solve social problems.

"You became rich from digging oil from the ground and making computers ? Too bad I need your money to solve Climate Change and feed the poor"

The blockchain is interesting - I think it can solve public trust issues like when it comes to e-voting and reaching decentralized concession. But when it comes to economics it just seems silly that a completely decentralized system makes sense.

Re:Bitcoin Technology Piques Interest on Wall Street by ilaksh on Saturday August 29, 2015 @05:05PM (#10141348)
> Money has one important purpose : 1) Efficient allocation of labor for society's benefit.

The real numbers show that maybe around a billion are obtaining much more benefit than they other 5/6 billion, and often because of the have-nots' labor.

So on that basis you are wrong. But also, tevhnology is rapidly making labor irrelevant, as more and more work is automated.

> Since by definition society requires centralization to direct its purpose.

Bitcoin is an example of a decentralized system with a common purpose. So is bittorrent. Or see any technology for distributing work or decision making.

Centralization in economics or politics leads to stagnation, authoritarianism, inequality. It is the primary problem that technology allows us to solve. Ordinary money was the first technology for solving over-centralization. We can do much better.

Re:Bitcoin Technology Piques Interest on Wall Street by f3llowtraveler on Saturday August 29, 2015 @03:48PM (#10141157)
> If we lived in a bitcoin world it would be impossible for governments to mobilize itself to direct resources to solve social problems.

Thank god. Can't happen soon enough.

Re:Bitcoin Technology Piques Interest on Wall Street by jchrisa on Saturday August 29, 2015 @07:12PM (#10141664)
The problem is that it's not decentralized enough. Bitcoin is still scarcity economics when we are ready for abundance.
Re:Bitcoin Technology Piques Interest on Wall Street by brighton36 on Saturday August 29, 2015 @06:00PM (#10141476)
Blockchains won't be efficient at voting for the simple reason that full transparency enables vote buying.