Originally posted by gaweidert Bitcoin is no different than any other fiat currency on the planet. And that includes the Euro and the American dollar. They are based upon no hard assets and most of it exists as numbers on computers. It is rather incredible that we think that a piece of paper with the number 100 on it is worth more than a same size piece Noof paper with the number 10 on it. No precious metals in any of their coinage either.
Well I wouldn’t say nothing backs the USD. The combined REAL assets of the United States Government - the government, not the private economy - as represented by the buildings, land, ports, roads and highways, resource values* on and under the land, military assets, possessions in other countries, and other real assets, has a value estimated at $75 Trillion. That doesn’t count the net
financial assets in possession of the government or its agencies, which you might also call fiat assets.
The US Gross External Debt @ 12/31/2017 was $19 Trillion Dollars
That’s why people will lend us half a Trillion dollars a year to finance the deficit.
* If the United States took a simple royalty on every barrel of oil pumped from leases on Federally-owned land and exported the oil to other counties (
all oil transactions globally occur in US Dollars, so in this example the dollars would come back to the US and be extinguished), the United States could pay down 100% of its externally held debt in 65 years. However, since the Dollar is the world’s Reserve Currency, removing that liquidity from the global economy would cause a permanent Depression. There wouldn’t be enough currency in circulation to operate the global economy. At this time, no other country or alliance of countries has the capacity to create enough currency to replace the USD if such a change were to occur.
CryptoCurrencies such as Bitcoin academically meet all the qualifications to be a legitimate currency. One of the attributes is that it must be hard to get. The mining aspect meets that qualification. Conceptually, CrytoCurrencies are elegantly brilliant. That’s the academic allure.
Bogus, sure, but conceptually brilliant.