Bitcoin increases the chances of a dystopian authoritarian future happening, precisely because for the most part the use cases where it actually works better than the regular banking system are when someone is trying to evade the law.
Proponents like to imagine that people using it to evade the law will mostly be using it to evade unpopular laws such as laws that restrict civil rights, but I thinking they are being way too optimistic. There are far more people who are simply criminals and fraudsters who need to evade popular laws in order to blackmail or steal from or scam ordinary people than people who need to evade unpopular unjust laws.
This will lead to public support for laws that extend things like KYC down to even small ordinary transactions and the government knowing how much you have and how much you spend and where it all came from and where it all goes. To make that work the government will need a lot more surveillance but the public will be fine with that.
"This will lead to public support for laws that extend things like KYC down to even small ordinary transactions and the government knowing how much you have and how much you spend and where it all came from and where it all goes. To make that work the government will need a lot more surveillance but the public will be fine with that.'
Just recently we've had scandals with Credit Suisse and HSBC banking criminals and laundering drug money, add in all the tax heavens which are fully in UK/US jurisdiction and I think total volume of bitcoin transactions willvpale in comparison
> There are far more people who are simply criminals and fraudsters who need to evade popular laws in order to blackmail or steal from or scam ordinary people than people who need to evade unpopular unjust laws.
Bless your heart. I hope you can preserve that innocence for many years to come — nobody in Venezuela or Argentina has the luxury of such ignorance†. So, even though I hope you can, I hope you choose not to.
One correction, though: the people who were donating to the truckers' protest weren't evading any laws. Rather, the government is evading laws in its illegal crackdown, and Bitcoin is providing a means to limit its unlawful powers.
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† Of course, not all of them think Bitcoin is a good idea! And they might be right.
Proponents like to imagine that people using it to evade the law will mostly be using it to evade unpopular laws such as laws that restrict civil rights, but I thinking they are being way too optimistic. There are far more people who are simply criminals and fraudsters who need to evade popular laws in order to blackmail or steal from or scam ordinary people than people who need to evade unpopular unjust laws.
This will lead to public support for laws that extend things like KYC down to even small ordinary transactions and the government knowing how much you have and how much you spend and where it all came from and where it all goes. To make that work the government will need a lot more surveillance but the public will be fine with that.