Can Bitcoin Replace Government-Issued Money? A Debate
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 21 ส.ค. 2019
- "Bitcoin is poorly suited to the purpose of becoming any nation's main medium of exchange."
That was the topic of a public debate hosted by the Soho Forum in New York City on August 12, 2019. It featured George Selgin, director of the Center for Monetary and Financial Alternatives at the Cato Institute, and economist Saifedean Ammous, author of The Bitcoin Standard: The Decentralized Alternative to Central Banking (2018). Soho Forum Director Gene Epstein moderated.
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It was an Oxford-style debate, in which the audience votes on the resolution at the beginning and end of the event, and the side that gains the most ground is victorious. Ammous prevailed in the debate by convincing 23 percent of audience members to change their minds.
Arguing for the affirmative was Selgin, whose books include Less Than Zero: The Case for a Falling Price Level in a Growing Economy (2018) and Floored! How a Misguided Fed Experiment Deepened and Prolonged the Great Recession (2018).
Ammous argued for the negative. An associate professor of economics at Lebanese American University, Ammous is also teaching an online course in bitcoin and Austrian economics.
The Soho Forum, which is partnered with the Reason Foundation, is a monthly debate series at the SubCulture Theater in Manhattan's East Village.
Music: "Modum" by Kai Engel is licensed under a CC-BY creative commons license.
Produced by Todd Krainin.
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"If you use a store of value that is easy to inflate you will not have any value left"
Saifedean for the win!
No one said the dollar was a store of value lol.
@@HenryPaulThe3rd money is used as a store of value
@@tammesikkema5322 No money or currency on Earth is used as a store of value. It is inflated on purpose with a target of 2%. So if you think losing 2% per year is a store of value you'll be in trouble. This is why US dollars, Euros, Yen, Yuan, and not options in your 401k. Stocks are the ONLY store of value. Everything else should be used to spend within 6 months. Money is used as a store of stability. So even through money won't increase in value it won't swing wildly giving you a hear attack. Stocks are an awesome store of value but if you need the money in 30 days you should NOT store it stocks keep it in checking. Unless of course you're a gambling man in which case I might suggest the casino it's more fun.
@@anthonypape6862 I know all of that is true. Which doesn't make me wrong, because sadly, most people ARE using it as a store of value. All of their savings are in fiat on the bank, and it saddens me, because it won't be worth shit in the future.
@@tammesikkema5322 oh. Ok that makes sense. I was unaware you knew the future. I also learned people are using fiat currency to store value. Maybe we should clarify time line. I would use a fiat savings account to save for a new dishwasher. Or a down payment on a home. Or an emergency fund = to six months pay after tax. That’s ok right?
listening after 3 years...still riveting ...both handled it gentlemanly....Saif is a genius!
This is the best argument I've heard for Bitcoin. Quote of the year: "It's a speculative asset, but that's how we're gonna eat central banks". I'm sold. You're buying freedom from government control. That alone makes me want to invest.
So invest, why tell everyone? If I wanted to invest in something I would keep quiet, but when people become so emotionally linked to BTC , red flags arise.
@@AFuller2020 imagine a financial system we can actually trust and anyone can audit the entire history of transactions 24/7 , 365 days a year, anywhere in the universe (if you have a wireless connection to any node in the network in theory) based on the principals of cryptography (as opposed to our insiders game of fiat money). You would try to save those who are ignorant to the problems were facing. Most of the inequality problems in our world are enabled by fiat...asset owners get wealthier while everyone else gets poorer. I mean banking the un-banked alone should make anyone want to advocate for crypto
@@matasuki governments and central banks were good and prudent until they removed the gold standard, effectively enabling them to print money without any basis at all. Those who reject bitcoin and cryptocurrencies always say "Bitcoin has no underlying assets." Well if you compare it to currency under gold standard, it's true. But those currencies are history. Today we cannot trace any piece of fiat money bill we have to real asset government should have. But in bitcoin, we can. And although technically bitcoin is a mathematical puzzle solved, it does require a lot of effort to decipher it so the value, and it is capped at 21 millions will make it more attractive. It is also divisible to how many decimals right, unlike dollars where we cannot say to people "I will pay you 0.00372946 dollar, you agree?". To me btc sounds a good alternative. Well I don't hate governments, we need them. But since they left gold standard system, no one is guaranteeing our purchasing power... just think about it
@@AFuller2020 yeah btc is not everything. it's just an innovation of money format and system. we should not worship it, just use it and let's see what unfold
@@matasuki why do you think btc is fairer? Rich people have been accumulating it since the beginning. They have the monopoly of btc and can lobby together to manipulate its price at will.
George Selgin - "Currencies aren't losing value quite quickly enough" 2022 - 'hold my beer'
saifedean crushed it
Saif is amazing and his book The Bitcoin Standard is even better.
Saifedean is the beast, I was impressed
He went beast mode
Unbelievable that it just took two years for most of the professor's arguments against Bitcoin to crumble. I will rewatch this debate every year.
Which ones exactly?
Bitcoin is still not money lol
@@OrthoHoppean El Salvador? 🤦♂️
@@anewhope538 Government enforced not from being an alternative to government fiat 🤦♂️
@@OrthoHoppean enforced=accepted as money either way 🤷🏾♂️ still functioning as money enforced or not lmao. Cry harder.
Selgin: "I want to see money privatized, but I don't think Bitcoin can do that". You will never have a private physical asset which the government doesn't control. They have a monopoly on physical force, not mathematics. bitcoin truly is the only chance
Plex ASM I agree, but what makes Bitcoin impossible for the government to capture isn't simply mathematics, but it's game-theoretical design.
@@vakeone true good point
Excellent points gentlemen.
I love crypto, but Bitcoin and any other POW blockchain can be 51% attacked all day long by the US government. It would be no challenge at all. So, let's be realistic here, Bitcoin is alive today because the government is tolerating it. It is most certainly not because the government can't stop it, that's just not a rational position for one to take.
@@johnhancock3031 its too late to 51% attack on btc its too strong and not worth it and the gov didn't take it serious and now its too late and yes the government can stop it all they have to do is destroy the internet.
Probably the best debate I ever saw about Bitcoin. I am fascinated how Saifedean can verbaly articulate so much critical thinking content, in so little time.
He is the master at explaining stuff simply.
They do not know how lightening works. You do not need to wait until the confirmation happens on the first level of bitcoin chain. By using lightening network the transactions on the lightening level happens almost instantly.
Wow I never saw bitcoin the way the writer of bitcoin standard explained. There is a difference between a final settlement system and a payment system. In the past gold was final settlement and paper money was the payment system. Jaw dropping!
davincij15 His book, The Bitcoin Standard, is excellent.
@@vakeone Why should a highly volatile, slow and expensive crypto like BTC be a currency or even store of value? What advantages would Bitcoin have compared to a decentralized stablecoin that even has flexible supply? Increasing when demand is higher, decreasing when demand is lower. A currency like Hayek teached.
Tom Bo what is the advantage of a flexible supply?
@@resmarted Economic sense. Free market where only demand rules. A deflationary coin like BTC would stop economic grow over time.
@@tombo3689 Why would it stop economic growth? Also are their any coins that even currently fit that description?
One year old debate and still the best to date imo --- he predicted 100B --> 2T bitcoin market cap in 10 years yet we're at 1T in 1 year. I'll check back in 10 years!
2 years old debate
@New Well good luck with that.
We don't need "democracy". The only real vote is the one people make with their money. Future will tell, but my money's on Bitcoin.
GTFO Shitcoin Shill
It doesn't really matter how high the market cap goes. Right now vendors don't accept Bitcoin. Also, Bitcoin would not be as big as it is without the major investors buying in. Once the investors see such low returns, they are going to pull out.
Bitcoin’s value is the potential money you gain from holding it…it has no other true values required to make it an established monies.
Professor Selgin unfortunately doesn't understand Bitcoin. His arguments were all against the suitability of Bitcoin on-chain payments being adopted as a means of payment not against Bitcoin (the currency) being adopted as a medium of exchange.
Early in the discussion he dismissed the Lightning Network as requiring trust and being poorly suited to payments to many different parties. These are fundamental misunderstandings of it, since neither are remotely true. Nevertheless, I'm glad Saifedean didn't address this directly, since it's also beside the point. As he rightly pointed out, you can put any existing layers on top of Bitcoin just as well as they go on top of fiat currencies. Whether it's PayPal, Visa, Mastercard, Lightning Network, something else, or a combination of many, payment networks provide the end-user payment ecosystem while the Bitcoin blockchain provides final settlement.
In my opinion he seems to understand it better than most bitcoin maximalists out here. As he points out, even if lighting network will work, it will just lead to centralized and thus partially trusted hubs. Sure that's still better than current system, but there are better crypto alternatives already out there so it doesn't make sense to just try to try to make bitcoin work for everything even though it's clearly not suited for it.
Hell even the author of the lightning network (Taj Draya ) whitepaper isn't sure if it's a good solution. There's a 1 hour interview with him on youtube where he basically says he longer sees lightning as a good solution and hasn't worked on it himself for over year.
We need a completely feeless DLT that can do data and payments. IOTA for example, that will be far superior to anything bitcoin + second layers can ever offer.
So the transactions on the settlement layer are unsensorable. But in the event that the dollar and the euro would suffer massive inflation and devalue against bitcoin (which is extemely likely), bitcoin would become massively more widely used. The settlement layer cannot scale. Layer 2 transactions are scalable but censorable. How would you tackle that problem?
@@TimvanHelsdingen Why do you think Lightning will lead to centralisation? The game theory of it points strongly away from this.
Also: Tadge Dryja - while very smart and a very important person in the development of Lightning - is quite simply wrong in his criticisms. Clever people can be wrong too (Satoshi was wrong many times as well; as several of us pointed out to him, and he graciously discussed and accepted). The main things Dryja fails to address are:
1) Other types of payment channels (beyond the Poon-Dryja channels to which his name is attached) can be used. Network-wide, many different channels can be used as long as each party agrees with their channel partner. This changes many aspects of the concerns around channel management that he raises.
2) Atomic Multipath Payments will dramatically change the channel landscape, as instead of requiring people providing large channels for large payments to go through, many small channels can be used instead. I personally will probably switch from having ~5-6 moderately sized channels to having hundreds of tiny channels once AMP is widely used. Note that this also helps with channel rebalancing, meaning less need for closing channels under normal use cases.
3) Channel Factories, allowing for a lot of channel management activities to be spawned from a single on-chain event.
IOTA isn't even worth discussing when talking about currencies and the payment technologies built over them. The idea of the tangle seems quite clever until you actually spend time looking at it and then you realise that it's utterly unsuitable as a technology to underlie a currency. It may have some limited interesting use cases in autonomous IOT consensus, but has too many significant flaws to ever have a global currency built on top of it.
@@dalebewan How does game theory point strongly away from it? It points exactly in the direction of centralization. Opening channels cost money, so you'll most likely don't want to open too many. Instead you connect to a hub which has a lot of open connections since that will be a lot cheaper. Also if you'd have bitcoin at 1 millions dollars like a lot of people believe opening a channel will costs in the hundreds of dollars. Most likely people will just get accounts somewhere where they don't even own private keys, thus negating the entire point of decentralization entirely.
Could you point out flaws you believe IOTA has? Yes it's far from being final, but neither is lightning network. There currently isn't anything even coming close to what they are building in terms of being IoT capable and they are as far as I know the only crypto which is in the process of being standardized for a ISO standard.
those arguing "it will never be fast enough" sound a lot like those who said video will never work on the internet
EGDL(ELROND)can do 10k op/sec
Like when Krugman said the internet was no more than just a fax machine.
It may sound like that, but it's correct. Bitcoin was designed to be slow on purpose.
@@cpphool no it wasnt. the white paper says it was meant to be used as money.
@@AC-wl7ve Kacper is correct. It has to do with block propagation and mining incentives. Very deliberate.
Enjoyed this! Saifedean was far stronger in his arguments.
damn u bad af shawty
So he means to tell me that he gives Bitcoin a bad grade due to people being able to hack the EXCHANGES??? An exchange is not a bitcoin lmao
But I dont see how all the people in history who have successfully robbed BANKS how that doesnt exceed the total amount stolen off of the exchanges that hold bitcoin
In my lifetime I have received at least 10 new Visa cards since they where hacked somewhere. I never had my BTC wallet hacked (and no, I dont keep money on exchanges).
We are developing a per to per settlement system, we currently are looking for any help to continue paying our programmers. Please help , our settlement system will be free and decentralized.
1PQVCETgvZg176WXESjYn82vrfC8MbspS8
He made 10 usd transaction on base layer of bitcoin and paid 1usd.
Think how much he must pay when he came to his bank and say "how much do I have to pay when I want you send this 10 usd bild direct to my friend?" In the same city he would pay 200 usd for that :))
@@vTruongCuong Venmo is free. So is cash app.
@@HenryPaulThe3rd yeah, venmo can be build for bitcoin, same as visa, paypal, you dont seem to understand Base Layer transaction and layer 2 layer 3 transaction.
Selgin: "You will NEVER be able to clear a payment instantly with bitcoin."
Me: buys a coffee on LN and clears payment in under 3 seconds and costs under 1 cent in fees. Then buys something via bitpay and also sees it cleared in seconds (for a few bucks) /raises eyebrow
actually he is right, LN payment is not "cleared" until you close the channel and broadcast the closing transaction on the BTC blockchain, actually, nothing has ever achieved "clear a payment instantly" globally in human history, and accusing bitcoin for that is just silly, considering bitcoin is by far the fastest way to clear payment globally. but i get your point
@@jorjiang1 As saif said, same as central banks who settle via large shipments of gold and cash. LN settles for 'payments' instantly and for settlement/clearing far quicker and with less friction. So he's not right in saying you will always have to wait for tx to settle, as we already do not have to. BTC is already instant for payments.
@@jamesbach1778 please actually read about how lightning works. there is NO such thing as an instant final settlement, it's a wet dream. Final settlement really means, the WHOLE world (or some institutions the whole world trust) have to witness and agree on a transfer of value(NOT only the two parties involved in that transaction), so if one of the party denies the transaction, the whole world will know he is lying, that's why a final settlement is HARD and time consuming. a LN transaction is just the agreement between 2 parties involved, theoretically, one party can deny the transaction has ever happened, only when the channel is closed, the transaction is verified by by miners and put on the btc blocktrain, the whole world would agree that the transaction happened, and THAT is a final settlement. but as i said even if it's not instant, it's still much faster than any other form of settlement, so btc still wins
@@jorjiang1 Maybe you should read what I actually wrote and not what you interpret from it? As I literally just said, "same as central banks who have to settle by sending cash and gold". On LN it settles from consumer end/pov instantly, just like Visa etc, it doesn't take 30 mins in practical terms, and it is far easier and has less friction than to settle gold/cash with actual finality, as happens now with banks.
@@jamesbach1778 "On LN it settles from consumer end/pov instantly" this is what you wrote, and it's wrong, settlement must be something the whole world (or something the whole world trusts) agree upon, if there is a bug or attack or mistake or whatever preventing the channel to be closed, no transaction happened on that channel will be recognized by the rest of the world except people in the channel. and that's exactly why LN is only recommended for small value transactions, because that kind of risk always exists and because it NOT a final settlement.
2 years later-- MOST if not all currencies are inflating exponentially, Safe Ammous was/is right.
I started an internet company in the mid 90s. At the time we had a fiber optic connection, as fast as you could have. People were saying we would someday be watching movies over the Net. I thought that were crazy, A five minute TH-cam clip would pause several times. I was wrong big time. The anti bitcoin guy is wrong big time. The tech and adoption will progress.
SAIF: the cost of an on-chain transaction fee is divided by the number of off-chain transactions it accounts for.
George: I payed a high transaction fee for my on-chain transaction.
jup, like talking to a loaf of bread. don't worry, people will get it eventually.
yea LOL. That wasn't even close to being a decent rebuttal.
Complete nonsense. If you have to do transactions off chain basically none of the arguments in favor of Bitcoin hold up because youre not using bitcoin anymore, its something different entirely. Youre using centralized databases with a trusted third party (like a bank but in this case, without any of the consumer protections).
@@MrSterlingsilver79 Centralization is fine for small transactions. I trust Visa to pay for my coffee.
@@MrSterlingsilver79 for the transaction.
But the store of value remains BTC main time chain
BitCoin IS the future. The world will be using BitCoin in future and banks and government having control over your money will be a thing of the past.... BUT BitCoin isn't there yet. It has a lot of technological improvement has needed before it can go mainstream. 20-30 years maybe.
2036
DigiByte 2035
At least I am happy I will be alive to see it (if I don't get killed in the meantime).
He fails to mention fiat currency looses a large portion of its buying value every year.
Just bought more Bitcoin, thank you Saifdean
I really hope you did lol
Honestly, it's so painful listening to Selgin. He really does NOT understand bitcoin at all and seems to refuse to listen to anyone who triues to explain. There are no fees and it is instant on second layer. It will cease to be volatile once it has gotten big enough. It wins because we do all want to hold it (see evidence from price) and that will continue until EVENTUALLY the deflationary drag has slowed down and it is spendable.
I pay my cleaner in silver, she wants BTC but I won't part with it. Neither of us want fiat. People like us are growing in number every day. I've paid lots of ppl in crypto in the last 4 years and it is escalating every year.
@Hon. Ian 😂😂😂
Ok a few questions then? How would Bitcoin become less volatile by it being „big enough“. Volatility would according to you only end when the value that bitcoins represent in any fiat currency is big enough (see what I did there it will still depend on the dollar, as by itself it wouldn’t matter)
Maybe it loses volatility, maybe it doesn’t, no one can predict that, yet it is more likely to reduce volatility with higher marketcap, but that would only matter if people would use them as a method of payment. As however, most of the worlds money is moved within the finacial markets this effect is incredibly low. Exactly where people speculate on assets such as BTC, and that’s the point it’s an asset, not a currency and as Long as the Financial World sees it that way that won’t change, and as they have the power to prevent it from being seen as a currency they could easily keep it this way, which is what they want to do to keep said power.
Furthermore most people invest in BTC, and don’t care about its usage, but how can one invest in a denationalized currency. Investment in ForEx only works if one assumes that the currencies underlying market is about to change in any direction, yet BTC doesn’t have an underlying economy. So how can you invest? Only by hoping that at a later point in time someone is willing to buy your BTC for a higher price than what you paid today, but effectively all you did was nothing (Zero sum game) as you’ll end up with dollars again - it’s speculation not investing, and certainly not using. Now the volatility is driven by new investors entering and or people cashing out, why would that ever stop as long as any stable fiat currency that is widely accepted as a payment method exists?
Why would any government allow BTC as a legal payment method once something terrorism related has happened? Why would they ever give up control? They wouldn’t, so the currency will never lose its speculative status.
What about the insanely high amount of energy the system needs? Nowadays it’s as much as a medium sized country, but that will only get worse, for effectively nothing. (Unless you’re in a country where there is no free market access, but what should stop governments in such countries from shutting down such systems on the internet?)
What about deflationary issues in 2140? They can be devastating to economies.
How to react to sth. such as covid?
What about manipulation by few very rich people that have most of the currency? They might be able to influence markets if they wanted to - very unrealistic though
Disclaimer I haven’t watched the debate yet, but I doubt there can be any fantastic counter arguments for all the questions I posed.
@@daveausmunchen7787 I have one answer for the deflationary crash issue on 2140 you mention. Bitcoin will be split to satoshi, its smallest unit (equivalent to cent in fiat currency), and it will contain quadrillions of satoshis, so every holder of bitcoin can use it as medium of exchange into fiat. Realistically fiat will always be there but the question is will fiat hold its value? Many people don't think so, that's why they invest in bitcoins and ethereums and doge and litecoins. If you think fiat will be more widely spread use even in 2100s yes you may be true. If you think fiat will maintain its value i doubt it since Joe Biden has said he would inject 1.6 trillion dollars that is printing 1.6 trillion dollars out of thin air, which of course will push dollar inflation higher. Everyone can be wrong but hey relax, if btc is wrong then it should crash and cease to exist, we will see.
@@daveausmunchen7787 i can write answers to your other questions actually. but will have to draft them first. Actually your questions are really good and illuminating, I really appreciate them. Will try to answer more in coming days. Stay safe
@@ismawan1980 Thanks for your kind response. I very much appreciate it, as it does somewhat prove my point. People don't use it as a currency, but as an investment, yet investing in a currency (which Cryptos technically are) is nothing else than a zero sum game.
All the splitting is right, but it doesn't change the fact that it is a deflation. There can't be more made. It's over at some point, splitting cents into let's say micro cents doesn't create inflation. Why inflation is actually a good thing can be easily read online. Of course as with everything the dose makes the poison.
So yes certainly FIAT won't have the same value and that's fantastic as it means that our Central banks will still incentivise investment and spending.
Your example Biden is an excellent choice to show that inflation and devaluation happens, yet it helps answer one of my questions to some extent. We can probably agree that stimulus is necessary (of course now one could start Keynes vs. Hayek, but that's books with hundreds of pages to debate with and about). So it raises the question, how would Cryptos solve such a problem? Which brings me back to the necessity of government controlled Fiat currencies, and back to my point about investing in Cryptos as currencies in general.
Now don't get me wrong, I love the technology and it can be used for so many fantastic things in voting, contracts, helping build stable economies in developing counties,... yet I just don't believe investing in a currency made up by these technologies is the best way. I'd rather look for companies trying to implement the Blockchain technology into our everyday life.
Until then, have a good one and stay safe too
31:50 The creation of money IS private. "Public" money, the coin and currency in circulation is barely 5% of the money created by corporations, the private supply of money. M3 has not been tracked since the 90s. Money is debt. Each loan is an expansion of the money supply.
Money is not debt. Fiat currency is debt. But money is not.
Exactly and bitcoin does not fundamentally change that. We need a monetary system that is not a commodity.
@@pepelapiu2004 spot on 👍at last the one in one billion who gets it.
Looking forward to watching this. I enjoyed reading Saifedean Ammous' book and can't wait to hear this discussion
Could you watch it?
Also read the book. Saif rocks
Julian Mauro Yes, I watched it. Selgin was a little cringey at times but Saif got his point across
Three years later and in fact lightning has succeeded . It does not require trust and although it is off chain, it is working extremely well. This debate has not aged well for you Mr. Selgin. In my country we have 1600 stores offering from food to clothing to just about any product you can think of available to buy with sats on the lightning network. Many companies in South Africa are actively working to increase this adoption and we are seeing increasing interest from every age group.
*GOOD VIDEO; EVERYONE NEEDS MORE THAN THEIR BASIC SALARY TO BE FINANCIALLY SECURED, THE BEST THING TO DO WITH YOUR MONEY IS TO INVEST, MONEY LEFT IN SAVINGS ALWAYS END UP USED WITH NO RETURNS,*
I totally agree with you, the Crypto market is the most profitable venture I ever invest in.,
I reached my goal of $500k yearly trade earnings.Setting realistic goals is an essential part of trading.,
most intelligent words I've heard,
Crypto is the new gold,
I'm a huge fan of crypto, I hold some few coins in my wallet.
Saif: Scarcity plus censorship resistance = the best money
George: Cheap transactions!
Scarce, censorship resistant what? It's not really money if you can't use it for everyday transactions.
That's why we have DigiByte
@@dgbmemes you're rekt dumbass
@@phamnuwen9442 with the bitcoin lightning network, bitcoin can be transacted instantly and cheaply for everyday payments.
@@plasticman2011 Bitcoin will scale on chain with instant transactions. Users will not settle for second layer tacked on band-aid solutions if they can affordably use true Nakamoto consensus Bitcoin transactions. Users will therefore migrate to a chain that scales and works as cash.
Both are right. Bitcoin will not be the "money" used for every transaction but it will become the foundation that money is layered upon.
A bitcoin foundation? You mean a digital foundation that DOES NOT EXIST AT ALL. It is like supporting existence on a foundation of non-existence!
You think currencies and money are the same. They are not. Time to study, B D.
@@darthvader5300 If it doesn't exist, how is there a 21 million bitcoin cap that cannot be exceeded? If it doesn't exist, why are there so many companies that spent over 8 figures in order to buy the land, resources, and tech to mine bitcoin?
@@JeanRausis In this case Bitcoin with a capital B is the monetary network (money) and bitcoin is the currency.
Yal are right, people just haven’t done the research and don’t understand how money works, even when it’s been around for hundreds of years. Many will unfortunately have to learn by going through the pain of hyperinflation. You can’t expect people in a country that throws more food away than the rest of the world when so many are starving, life is too good for too many right now, they’re just too incentivesed to keep the monopoly game going. If bitcoin is measured in dollars then the volatility is a reflection of the dollar in my opinion. Wake up ppl
Saif is amazing in this debate.
I see so much similarities between Bitcoin and the Internet back in the 80's. Everyone said it was not going to happen, technological completely impossible and hilarious. And it happend.
34:58 Saying that Western Union Payments are better is ludicrous! I've done many, they are VERY expensive and require KYC and I have had cases where the credit card got blocked several times and it took me days to complete the Western Union transaction. Bitcoin has the advantage of being cheaper, faster (the recipient needs to go to the Western Union office or needs to read the email to release the funds and send possible goods in exchange). Null argument and as for a professor of course only theoretical. He probably has never done Western Union remittance. Third-party risk and censorability and confiscatability bro!
Maybe WU will partner with bitcoin like moneygram did?
audiovideotweaker moneygram and #xrp
Really don't know why he mentioned Western Union way better options out there also bitcoin is slow
The first Speaker states that he has been arguing for privatization of the monetary system. But all central banks are already privatized and that is clearly not working.
They're government chartered monopolies, not market productions.
Selgin has been arguing for the abolition of government-backed central banks (or at least their legal monopolies) pretty much his entire career. He's for a completely market-based monetary system and often refers to successes of the nearly 100% unregulated banking/monetary systems of Scotland (1716-1845) and Canada (1817-1935) as evidence that a private decentralized system of competitive note issuance is superior to a fiat system controlled by a government-sponsored central bank.
The Fed isn't privatized in any meaningful sense, even though the branches are owned by banks. They're not autonomous or free from government, far from it.
Exactly.
Are you serious bro? All central banks are government-privileged banks. Nothing private about then. By privatizing banks, he means free banking. Laissez faire in banking.
Saifedean Ammous was incredible
Saifedean is a mouth-breathing pseudo-Austrian who's clearly never read Mises but LARPs like he has.
@@chronotriggerfan bit salty? You didn't buy in yet? 😂
@@cryptoverse1014 Naww, just a bit miffed that you newcomers have ruined BTC and now advocate for re-creating central banking with trusted LN nodes.
You haven't read Mises either, I take it?
@@chronotriggerfan ruined it how? Because we al have different visions of how to make BTC great? You think your opinion is the right one? That's why we have a decentralised system mate. You can bring your points forward Sir Troll
@@cryptoverse1014 lololololoolol do you think unilateral Pull Request control is "decentralized"?
Do you think having a single group controlling nearly all of protocol development is "decentralized"?
Do you think removing Gavin Andressen's repo access is "decentralized," or the behavior of Kingmakers?
The Crowd may think otherwise, but you are completely outclassed here.
I just ordered a meal online in Poland. One of the options was - suprise - BITCOIN.
Gdzie?
@@mikeehrmantraut6061 We can order food with bitcoin for a few years in Belgium :D
Here in switzerland too... BTC rulez the world... Or maybe DGB😉😁
Where in belgium ?
@@jickovonrozentuin7370 Its the brainwashed leading the brainwashed. No company accepts Bitcoin, they accept payments from Bitpay, which is in Dollars, Euros or other currencies, NOT IN BITCOINS....
I’m listening to this 3 years after the debate. In that time period M2 has grown from approximately $13T to $24T. Whoops! Also, I think the pivotal moment in the debate between 1:03:00 and 1:06:00 when Saifedean drives homes his example of a PayPal transaction final settlement taking just as long as one using BTC would.
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Excellent debate. I would have argued that for any currency that wants to disrupt current FIAT money does not have to be significantly better. In fact, what is likely to happen is that FIAT money will become worthless and that makes BTC significantly better already. The only thing which is IMHO still needed is layer 2 to be working in an easy way, with good anonymity ensured.
And now there is Lightning. And soon to be many more applications and protocols built on Bitcoin.
That’s a good point. Selgin seems to underestimate how much fiat currencies will screw over the average man and make him yearn for something better.
20 minutes in... already a great debate.
Great debate gentlemen! Was closer than I suspected but I believe Saif was able to offer more cogent arguments for BTC as a monetary system. Fiat is losing its attractiveness. Interesting to see what the BTC network effects will be in the next few years
I'm from the future, continues to grow
He continues to miss the fact that bitcoin is at tractable because yet people want it to rise in price but it has been increasing for 10 years... and has been the best asset in the world. It is the greatest store of value in history
I think the blockchain style system will inevitably be applied to the majority of digital transactions, however, exponentially speculative cryptocurrencies ring a bit temporary, like Napoleon d'Or. Nation states are more likely to overcomplicate the process, by using a system measuring nation identifying credits in user-friendly digital wallets - retiring physical currency in most transactions. Perhaps, extremely expensive scientific supplies (element diverse) and precious artworks would still command prices worthy of trading physical rare metals.
".....some risk they'll abuse their [fiat] money creation powers...." wow, masterly understatement
Regardless of price, everyday that passes, BTC will have worldwide trust which is key to money.
Everything makes more sense witt bitcoin.
How long does it take for your money to reach the merchant when you buy by Visa? You might be surprised - it's longer than 10m to an hour - AND there is a huge fee you don't see.
This is like the transition away from non mechanised agriculture to mechanised agriculture. Those selling rakes, shovels and scythes were never gonna sit by quietly..
Then they got ploughed into the ground by a Massey Ferguson 🚜
He’s never heard of the lightning network evidently. No more money printing 😁😁😎
I vote in favor of Bitcoin argument. Bitcoin is going to be ultimate world classic currency
We are developing a per to per settlement system, we currently are looking for any help to continue paying our programmers. Please help , our settlement system will be free and decentralized.
1PQVCETgvZg176WXESjYn82vrfC8MbspS8
Venkatesh Nara i think you r wrong because there is only going to be 21 million bitcoin and 7.53 billion people in the world.. there is not enough bitcoin to go around. Bitcoin is an asset against inflation and other bs that centralized banks likes to do..
but i believe there will be government backed cryptocurrency for each countries..
@@coolguy726 you can split 1 btc into multiple decimal places. For example 100,000,000 sats is 1 btc
This was amazing debate
I really enjoyed this informative debate. Both presented their case well and gracefully debated.
48:45 Saif wins the debate here. I'm totally embarrassed for Selgin.
Saif is being incredibly deceptive at that point.The entire discussion is moot if the tech is improved. Bitcoin Cash (BCH) actually fulfills all requirements that both debaters ask for and it is backed by the long-term interests of the mining network companies. On Bitcoin (BTC) the shopper would still need to send a tx that can cost $1-$40 to be accepted into the mempool because Bitcoin (BTC) is rate limited to 7 tx/sec worldwide. BTC tx fees are as high if not higher than credit card txs since 2017 when compared to zelle or alipay.
Instant confirmation (First Seen Rule 2-3 seconds), 100 tx/sec and rising with Graphene, X Thinner and Bloxroute tech and a growing community with all of the Original Bitcoin supporters.
Innovation in tech is the way to have your cake and eat it.
@@jeskashum5176 no, BCH doesn't fulfill the requirement of being a hard money because BCHs parameters are way too easy to change via hardforks - BCH did hardforks to increase blocksizes, manipulate the mining difficulty, and will likely need to introduce perpetual inflation to incentivize mining. Bitcoin is the only crypto that has the potential to be a global sound money. Also, you are confusing payments with money.
@@jeskashum5176 but the method by which you want to "improve" the tech destroys its hard money properties. Most notably, all of those millions of bch tokens were instantaneously printed out of thin air by a central authority. Digital fiat. This is what bch proponents just can't seem to grasp and they try to soothe their cognitive dissonance by dreaming up wild conspiracy theories or hurling insults.
At the debate, Saif was voted the winner with 51% of the votes. Selgin only got 41% of the votes.
2 years after the debate it is clear for nearly everybody, that over the lighting network can be handled millions of transaction per second instantaneously with a fee which is a fraction of a cent.
42:49 Credit card transactions can be several percent of the purchase value. I would hardly consider this "small".
Remember that most economist are completely detached from reality as the state rewards them handsomely for spouting this kind of propaganda.
Keep in mind the current system allows you to reverse a.crooked transaction. This is one of the few benefits.
@@davincij15 Reversed transactions are terrible for merchants. The finality of transactions is one of the many excellent features of Bitcoin.
@@phamnuwen9442 I agree it adds to the cost of transactions as the merchant needs to factor in the losses due to credit card fraud.
Credit card fees, paid by merchants, are so high that often times merchants complain about how much they spend on accepting credit card. For some of the larger retailers, they pay more in credit card fees than they get in profits! Think about that.
This didn't age well for the professor.🤔
It’s still too early to tell. Bitcoins price/market cap is soaring right now, yes. However the discussion was about whether bitcoin will be a regular medium of exchange. It is not. It right now it’s still being treated as a store of value, not as a medium of exchange. All we can do is wait and see.. personally i can’t see bitcoin being used as a day to day medium of exchange like the dollar? it seems to me that that responsibility will fall upon 2nd and 3rd generation coins.
Once bitcoin gets integrated with Amazon, Ebay and Walmart, it will become mainstream and will soar. The recent rise of bitcoin will create more than enough trickle down investment money that will help to finish creating the cryptos (softwares) that will build these bridges.
I think it’s aging well
If Bitcoin replaced government money it would be a more free form of pay, also taxation would be hard for governments to do at this time for employees getting paid in bitcoin.
how would it be hard? "give me your bitcoin addresses or I send men with guns to get you" + chainalytics works pretty well on a public ledger.
@@marcusjackson5837 Efficient QC are more of a threat to traditional finance and government top secrets than Bitcoin. Efficient QC do not break Bitcoin as it exists today at all , just weaken some of Bitcoins security assumptions that could be fixed buy soft forking in Lamport signatures. It is also unclear if efficient QC can ever be a thing as well , but these concerns have already been addressed in Bitcoin
@@b.griffin317 I agree that taxes will still exist regardless but not for the reasons you indicate because BTC is already very private with wallets like wasabi or lightning transactions where chainanalysis employees admit they are hopeless to these existing solutions. The reasons why taxes will still be exist is governments can simply switch to focus more on collecting VAT tax, tarrifs or property taxes instead of income taxes.
@@sanisidrocr is lightening ever going to really take off? and doesn't it cause centralization and the vulnerability that causes? for wasabi, it's main privacy features are tor and coin join IIRC, yes? AFAIK those are hardly bullet-proof.
main enforcement mechanism for income tax is to focus enforcement on business because they are fewer in number than the gen pop and easier to spot. it doesn't pick up every transaction, but it does most. any unreported tx on the blockchain will be investigated as tax evasion. gov's will form a compact to all do the same so you can't claim it happened somewhere else. if you make one privacy mistake ever they will link you to the rest and then the men with guns show up. will it pick up everyone? nope. will it put the fear of god into 90%? sure. the other 10% will get called gangsters.
@@b.griffin317 Lightning is already great and useful. I use it almost daily and no it does not cause centralization. Here is what an employee of chainalysis said about wasabi - removeddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/c4so58/i_am_a_current_or_former_employee_of_chainalysis/
>Initially, the difficulty was standard mixers (still are) but now I would say Wassabi is enemy number one. **There is no way to de-anonymize it, and I don't see how the government can legally take Wassabi down, so it will probably persist.** Put it this way, if everyone used Wassabi, Chainalysis would go out of business.
Those that suggest the government can deanomynize BTC really don't know what currently exists and other solutions that are almost ready- dandelion, CT, schnorr,mast,taproot and more
I love you Gene Epstein keep up the great work man.
I wish I can see one of these debates in real life some time soon
This video will age poorly for that guy who is against Bitcoin...
I think it’s aging quite well
I actually laughed out loud when the professor started knocking bitcoin security because bitcoin exchanges had been hacked. This is like claiming that the dollar is no good as a currency because someone walked into a bank with a gun and walked out with a bag full of money. The problem is with the exchanges not with the currency i.e. Bitcoin. A third grader could see the flaw in his argument I’m not quite certain why he could not.
Yeah that flew right over your head. Why is it that no one is hacking banks but they are hacking coin exchanges? That’s has something to do with cryptocurrency. Also, bitcoin cannot he reversed so the banks or the gov don’t offer you any insurance for the theft. Plus they get your wallet name and can see literally every transaction you’ve ever done. It’s horrible lol. Clearly you are the 3rd grader lmao
@@ukulayme2 First he was referring to EXCHANGES getting hacked. The vast majority of Bitcoin is purchased and stored in hardware wallets not in exchanges. Get that straight.
Try and hack
Bitcoin stored on a hardware wallet. It’s hack-proof. No one with any sense stores crypto on exchanges. I grant you there was risk and there are some unscrupulous exchanges but that is ending quickly.
They are not hacking banks because banks are protected by the US govt and bankers and banks contribute to the campaigns of those in the Federal government. It has nothing to do with crypto as a product but everything to do with who the Federal Govt and it’s laws chooses to protect. Do you really think banks that hold “money” on a data base cannot be hacked ?This had nothing to do with the ease of hacking dollars or crypto on an exchange and only to do with the fact no one cares about crypto exchanges being hacked up till now. Now that Paypal and Fidelity are in the game let’s see how many crypto coins get stolen from them. The professor failed to make this critical distinction.
Insurance on your bank deposits feels nice but is a systemic joke. Do a little research on the FDIC and see how well they are funded. Claims of insurance on deposits are as trustworthy as claims on solvency of the Fed.
Do more homework.
@@jsmdify The vast majority of Bitcoin is owned by only a couple people on hard wallets. Everyday investors and users have them on exchanges that are vulnerable to hacking
@@ukulayme2 You are a 2nd grader. Nobody in their right mind would hold their bitcoin on an exchange. Why would you risk getting your BTC stolen on an exchange when you can store it yourself in your own hack-proof wallet.
@@jazes8423 no one stores their bitcoin in cold wallets except bitcoin nerds. More retail investors just keep it on the exchange.
Selgin represents Cato, while Saif represents Mises.
Every single time, the Mises Institute wins.
Aaah no
Very healthy debate & informative. Like it.
34:58 What kind of professor is this? He clearly doesn't understand the asymmetry of technological development. Saying it's too expensive to settle 2. layer payments for the entire population using it is true NOW - but we already have solutions in development (Channel Factories), that together with Shnorr signatures combine 1000 transactions into 1 transaction - that transactions can then again be one of other 1000 channel factory combined transactions = 1000x1000 transactions - those then AGAIN can be combined into... well you get it.... TOTAL fail on the Prof. side. Problem will be solved.
I have to admit that mr. Selgin critic to Bitcoin at the beginning of the video Is the smartest and the most competent i've ever heard.
It's because he started off pointing out the advantages of bitcoin (: ... He does have a point about the difficulty of replacing currencies
Saifedean is sharp as a razorblade. Great debate guys, Saifedean gets my vote, easily.
It’s because of the ribeyes.
2013 arguments called..
There were plenty of real estate bubbles under the gold standard. There were land bubbles in 1819, 1837, 1857 and 1893. There were also asset bubbles going back to tulips in 1634. Henry George wrote Progress And Poverty in 1879 which talked a lot about land bubbles.
There will always be (land) bubbles, but under a gold standard or bitcoin standard they are not as exaggerated as with fiat money.
Due to the nature of gold, we've never had a true gold standard, in the theoretical sense. It's always been more or less fractional. Overtly so during and after the civil war.
Saif killed it!
These two both have brilliant minds. Instead of thinking that it's one versus the other think of them as two men that could be a part of a powerful think thank. The key to not being weak is leveraging the strengths of others.
Had to stop watching on the 2nd reply when he said youll never be able to use it for purchases without waiting hours...
I mean, hes either straight up lying, or an idiot, and both are a waste of my time.
Its like telling someone they cant breathe, when they are breathing in front of you.
in Portugal we can send EUR to other banks and get instant settlement, it is called MBWay , companies like revolut are allowing this to be done internationally too
That’s not final settlement that they’re talking here. In your example revolut credit the euro to your account, but they can still in control of your money.
I settled on amazon years ago then had to do a refund and customer returned damaged non sellable goods. Final transaction took a while just saying.
1:05:40 Saif just won the debate at this point. Plus, he used the term "orthogonal" I had to stop and check that word in the dictionary. Kudos
I took some antibiotics for orthogonal once. Luckily the itching and redness went away after a week
For the lazy
or·thog·o·nal
/ôrˈTHäɡənl/
Learn to pronounce
adjective
adjective: orthogonal
1.
of or involving right angles; at right angles.
2.
STATISTICS
(of variates) statistically independent.
(of an experiment) having variates which can be treated as statistically independent.
@@AK-gq5mi In general use, I think orthogonal means one thing is independent with respect to another. The water supply at your house is orthogonal to your electricity supply.
Saifedean was on a totally different level..👏🏻
He seemed nervous to me. Anyway, good luck with your millions.
This aged like milk for fiat and fine wine for BTC.
people confuse the current state of innovation with the end state of the innovation. why would anyone think the scaling would stop?. the internet (failed to scale) and continues to fail to scale today.
I will come back in 10 years 🍾
with a big smile right :)
When governments have created their own digi currency and have banned all alternatives.
You’re either nuts or very young if you don’t believe this is the most likely outcome.
@@allegorx58 banning doesn't work. censorship doesn't work. Bitcoin will always be used.
You guys forget Gresham's Law!!
Austrian Economist you forgot Thier's law. Without a govt to enforce price controls, then gresham's law cant exist
There is no law its only human action
Awesome thanks
I think he’s looking at it in the opposite way as Bitcoin properties slows down transactions during mass adoption instead of looking at Bitcoin as the dollar and second layer solutions as payment systems
Safedean demolished his statements with his smile!
I wonder if the Professor was negative on the internet in the early to mid 90's?
Oh wow that closing... That's the win team speaking right there
Nice debate!!!!
For me the most unattractive feature of Govt money is its political nature (bonding people involuntarily to nation states which unfortunately for the people, Govts will not change).
The most unattractive feature of Bitcoin (especially within the LN) is its current UI (which fortunately is being improved for users while we are living on).
this did not age well for George Selgin
Sure it did
can someone explain what he means at 30 min mark when gold has draw backs since it is also used in industrial goods i thought it would be a plus not a negative?
Comparing hacked exchanges to hacked banks indicates George doesn't understand self-custody, or he's being purposely misleading.
Volatility is reflective of the newness of Bitcoin. As acceptance spreads, volatility decreases.
Scalability to small transactions has been solved via the lightning network.
George's argument that serious inflation isn't hitting USD is funny in May of 2022.
Interesting he mentions how a person can do more with Western Union than Bitcoin yet Western Union last year received a patent to implement blockchain technology 🤔🤦🏾♂️ this guy has no idea what he's talking about. He did not come prepared
he barely even bothered to get dressed or brush his hair.
As far as the hacking goes what do we call counterfeit money... A hack on the dollar.
great point
tether for instance is a 4 billion counterfeit
It's like chasing the wind....
El Salvador is the first country adopting Bitcoin as official money now in 2021
Yes, bitcoin is winning by default. People are greedy and hate being stolen from (inflation, taxes). Perfect fundamentals for BTC to succeed.
I agree bitcoin is good but it has some flaws that other cryptos have solved. High fees, non-instant confirmations, lack of blockchain level privacy etc. BTC is good for high-value transactions that are online though.
@@joshn2342323 Bitcoin will be the rolex of the cryptocurrency market. As nobody uses rolex for checking the current time, almost nobody will use bitcoin for daily money transaction. But it will be still the original technology that revolutionized the fintech world. So it will be an asset like gold nowadays.
And Portugal is now crypto tax free !!
Volatility : With adoption/distribution and deeper books, the volatility will collapse. As time progresses, you can see that volatility is going down. Speed: Lightning network now has close to 60MM dollar in the channels. Those protocols are second layer solutions that sits on top of the primary layer. Lightning network can process transactions at billions of transactions per second without having custody risk! So there you go! Addressed your major objections. That was easy! Super easy!
Still seems extremely volatile
Bitcoin > Fiat
Old world finance man just wants a Bitcoin that's not capped and his cronies can control.
This moderator again lmao! He was crazy in Erik vorhers vs Peter shills
1) The economy will continue turning digital. Credit cards are not the last step of a digital economy. A digital coin is.
2) If civilization continues, the internet will continue, the economy will become fully digital. A digital coin is only a logical step.
I have bitcoin and I will hold them as long as I can. It is the very first digital coin in makind's history. I don't expect it to loose value any time soon (unless civilization crashes and all money (including fiat) looses its value.
@Everett Lara Me neither, actually. I'm 31 years old and I've never even tried to have a credit card. Fuck that! I only use money I already own. So, good for you mate.
I do have bitcoin, though, as a long-term investment. If I sell today, I win 150% from what I originally bought. How much would it be worth in 2030? Who knows, but I can't wait to find out.
26:02 I don't think that's even an issue. In India there's the UPI system that moves money instantly without cost.
I don't understand why this doesn't have millions of views