Comment on Anon gives up on Bitcoin in 2010
DavidDoesLemmy@aussie.zone 17 hours agoI don’t know why you’re connecting paying taxes with a currency with it being legitimate. I don’t think those things are related
Comment on Anon gives up on Bitcoin in 2010
DavidDoesLemmy@aussie.zone 17 hours agoI don’t know why you’re connecting paying taxes with a currency with it being legitimate. I don’t think those things are related
merc@sh.itjust.works 7 hours ago
Because actual money has sources and sinks. If you look at MMT for example, they talk about government spending not as being a way for the government to distribute money, but actually as a way the government creates money. When the government taxes money, it doesn’t just collect it, it destroys it.
So, based on how much a government is spending and taxing, it’s adjusting the supply of money in the economy. The fact that government spending is roughly the same year-to-year, and that taxes are roughly the same year-to-year gives a stability and flow to actual money. There’s a constant demand for it because every year the US government requires that people and businesses submit $4.5 trillion in taxes. There’s a constant supply because the US government spends more than $6 trillion.
Bitcoin doesn’t have those sources and sinks. There’s no constant demand for bitcoin every year to pay taxes. There’s no constant supply as a government spends bitcoin into the economy. The “realness” of money is intimately tied to taxes and government spending.
DavidDoesLemmy@aussie.zone 5 hours ago
The fact that Bitcoin works differently to fiat is what gives it value to some people. Being different is the point.
merc@sh.itjust.works 2 hours ago
Sure, in the past people had gold for the same purpose. The difference is that gold has at least some intrinsic value. It can be made into beautiful jewelry. It has industrial uses. Bitcoin has no intrinsic value, so if people lose confidence it could drop to 0.