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Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by puranjay on Thursday October 17, 2019 @12:46AM (#21278988)
> We have countries that have no reliable form of currency at all, again bitcoin solves that problem

Countries that don't have reliable forms of currency also don't have reliable power or internet access.

Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by biolurker1 on Thursday October 17, 2019 @07:42AM (#21280956)
this will change with satellite internet coming for the masses and will make Bitcoin really useful in war regimes
Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by zygimantasdev on Thursday October 17, 2019 @12:54AM (#21279020)
I would argue all currencies are unreliable ,because they go down in value due increase of supply. Throwing 2-4% every year sounds awful
Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by atq2119 on Thursday October 17, 2019 @02:36AM (#21279466)
This gets repeated over and over again, but the causality of this has never been proven, as incredible as that may sound.

Yes, the causality of "create too much money -> inflation" is plausible (but note the emphasis on "too much").

However, we live in a world of endogenous money, where money is largely created by commercial banks in the form of loans to private entities. When prices increase, those loans get bigger. So there is also the causality "inflation -> create more money".

At the same time, there are other factors that can drive inflation, such as workers and companies exercising price setting power (which Econ 101 likes to pretend doesn't exist, but plays an important role in the real world).

So yeah, the causality that you're casually throwing out there hasn't actually been proven as the driving factor here.

At the same time, the widespread belief in it and similar misunderstandings causes us as a society to make extremely damaging macroeconomic policy decisions, in particular the decision to attempt to fight recessions using monetary policy instead of fiscal policy.

Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by zygimantasdev on Thursday October 17, 2019 @10:46AM (#21282598)
Thank you for reply, it is extremely interesting. Can you recommend books/any type of articles on this topic?
Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by paulmd on Thursday October 17, 2019 @02:48AM (#21279524)
bingo, money is enormously more complicated than microecon suggests. Micro-econ thinks Keynesian economics are full of shit, yet they stimulated us right out of a micro-economic hole during the 30s.
Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by londons_explore on Thursday October 17, 2019 @03:14AM (#21279637)
Bitcoins rate of coin creation is also ~7% per year at the moment...
Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by tromp on Thursday October 17, 2019 @07:23AM (#21280857)
No; it's approximately 3%.

We had 4 years with 4x the reward, 4 years with 2x the reward, and about 3 years with the current reward, which makes for 1/(4x4+4x2+3) = 1/27 inflation.

Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by sodafountan on Thursday October 17, 2019 @12:51AM (#21279004)
and yet all you need is a simple phone and access to these satellites: https://blockstream.com/satellite/

I agree the infrastructure isn't there yet but problems with national currency is a government issue, infrastructure issues can usually be solved but governmental issues tend to be a lot harder and all countries that rely on fiat currency are subject to inflation

Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by puranjay on Thursday October 17, 2019 @01:12AM (#21279098)
Countries that don't have reliable currencies are countries like South Sudan and Somalia. Do you really expect illiterate people (3 in 4 women in Somalia are illiterate, 1 in 2 men) to use Blockstream?

You can tell that Bitcoin, and its advocates, are from developed countries. No one who has lived in a developing country and seen crushing poverty would make such arguments.

Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by RidingPegasus on Thursday October 17, 2019 @02:25AM (#21279426)
Given the choice would you suggest a person from somewhere such as Venezuela keep their personal savings in Bitcoin or Venezuelan bolívars?
Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by paulmd on Thursday October 17, 2019 @02:46AM (#21279516)
I'd suggest keeping it in USD or other hard currency. Bitcoin provides no advantages in obtaining/transacting hard currency relative to other currencies, nor any stability while holding it. Either way you are going to a black market, and you are paying real, unaffordable conversion rates compared to transacting in (worthless) hyperinflationary currency.

The bitcoin guy is not going to accept 1 Zimbabwe dollar to 1 USD any more than your black market dealer who has USD. The real currency conversion rate is the problem, not the act of obtaining actual hard currency.

Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by zadler on Thursday October 17, 2019 @03:45AM (#21279804)
USD bills can’t be easily transferred over the Internet.
Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by paulmd on Thursday October 17, 2019 @04:41AM (#21280053)
look at this scrub who's never heard of venmo

yes, there are a lot of fungible ways to transfer hard currency over the internet... once you acquire it.

again: acquiring it is the hard part, because nobody wants to trade a zimbabwe dollar for a USD.

Bitcoin does nothing to help your zimbabwe dollars be less worthless than they are in USD, therefore they don't help the currency conversion process at all.

Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by feanaro on Thursday October 17, 2019 @08:02AM (#21281088)
Venmo, the service exclusively available in the United States? https://help.venmo.com/hc/en-us/articles/235225428-Signing-U...
Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by atq2119 on Thursday October 17, 2019 @02:39AM (#21279482)
This is a false dichotomy, since USD are very widely spread on South America.
Re:Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index by arcticbull on Thursday October 17, 2019 @01:08PM (#21284114)
Each BTC transaction fee costs 2 weeks average wages in Venezuela my dude.