If you've been online for any amount of time in the past few years you've heard a thing or two about this thing decentralized digital currency decentralized means it's not regulated or validated through a governing body or bank and digital means yeah but the one argument I see most often in defense of it the core argument for why cryptocurrency really matters just never made any sense to me it's the idea that crypto will one day replace government-backed fiat currency we'll stop using this and we'll start using this to trade and engage in commerce and the US dollar will just be thrown out who cares anymore.
So the first thing you'll hear in this argument is that real money isn't real it's fake it's backed by nothing once we left the gold standard money is just a fictitious number given to work the only reason that a dollar is worth a dollar is because the government said so and businesses use that to manipulate the stuffs in the case of a digital asset ones whose value is derived from the people themselves rather than a large governing shady institution it can have more validity than this money isn't fake just because it's not based on gold doesn't mean it's not based on something now any currency since we left the bartering system has to be based on work is a measure of time plus effort generally in regards to producing a good or providing a service granted a lot of money is earned by individuals who aren't providing that time or effort but the money's innate value is still derivative of that the work element is important but the reason we even associate work with these pieces of paper is also important this is backed by a government who does have tangible means to well back it up let's take the United States of america because of course that's what i'm gonna bring up.
The dollar while it doesn't equate to a specific amount of gold anymore still does have some correlation to a real world value you could argue that the dollar is a fractional representation of the total united states gdp the value of all services and goods provided within and by the country when viewed individually it has no value but within the context of that group it does on the other hand cryptocurrency's value is derived from nothing it's unlocked through meaningless computations that don't have any correlation with work or any basis beyond creating cryptocurrency.
I know the argument is that well we give it value we decide the people for a while it was believed that instability in the government or especially inflation would correlate with a higher price in cryptocurrencies people would want to transition their assets into something that would be fundamentally not tied to this and i'll admit for a while I believed crypto would have dysfunction but no inflation rates are still really high and crypto is just yeah many have said once cryptocurrency stabilizes then it can be used as a proper means of transactions like it won't be jumping around this much but that may never happen see it would require that the equivalent of trillions of US dollars were being spent by people using just a single cryptocurrency on actual goods not speculative markets and that can't happen you know unless it's already stable because businesses won't accept a speculative coin it won't be used for trading because it's not stable and it won't be stable because it's not used for trading it's a catch-22 companies that have vested interest in these coins will allow users even today to buy stuff with them because they expect it could increase in value and then they can sell it for real money.
These specific use cases is more about taking advantage of the situation than actually making this a new currency you know some argue the decentralized nature of crypto means it's no longer susceptible to manipulation like government-backed fiat currency but you know it still is even more so because no regulations exist some entities do have more control over this market than just the people in early march 2020 it seemed possible bitcoin could hit zero and it may have but major trading sites stop transactions at a rather convenient time.
A lot of problems are just because it is a decentralized currency okay so here's an example remember when ole elon musk said he would accept bitcoins for tesla well we know he had a large dash of bitcoins already after he dropped the news the value of the coin shoots up he sells them all and then announces they won't accept bitcoin anymore the price falls he buys back in and remember when he said dogecoin was great and it shot up in value well dogecoin isn't even a real cryptocurrency it mean it's a joke based off real cryptocurrency it can be infinitely reproduced so it has actually no value but if people buy it up faster than its mind then its value increases elon musk knows this so he bought a lot of dogecoin values goes up and then sell repeat the cycle and make profit now if these were stocks this would be incredibly illegal and get musk in deep with the sec but coins aren't protected again they're decentralized so market manipulation is super easy and that's what happened since I know people will mention this in the comments it will talk about what if the united states and all governments collapsed due to some horrific apocalyptic situation in this scenario crypto would be ideal right well if society did collapse in this function it'd be pretty unlikely that internet and electricity services are still running or reliable it mean even in the case of a mass blackout having a fully digital currency with no real world backing does sound like a bad idea.
If hyperinflation were to take place yeah it's a great idea to transfer your money into that crypto but then trade it back to a government-backed stable currency i know crypto has made a lot of people a lot of money i used to trade it quite a bit but i don't have any grand illusions about this stuff nowadays it just it's getting gross with all the crypto bros and the ads people might tell you this is disruptive tech but that's exactly what people that want to make money will say about something it's not that all of this needs to be used in a awful way but more often than not it is a speculative market requires that more people get involved in any normal business opportunity you're not going to have random people screaming at you about how great this is they want you to be the one that puts money in and loses it when it all comes crashing down the utopian ideals of this stuff it's not realistic it's based on a fallacy a common misconception about the nature of money it's all about speculation it's about making money without really making anything squarespace gives people a powerful and beautiful online platform from which to create your own website connect with your audience and generate revenue through gated members only content manage your members send email communications and leverage audience insights all on one easy to use platform.
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