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Megan McArdle: If bitcoin is good as money, governments will crush it
Indeed, just as they already strive to crush gold, but financial news organizations refuse to get into that.
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Bitcoin Is an Implausible Currency
By Megan McArdle
Bloomberg News
Wednesday, December 27, 2017
Is bitcoin money or a payment system? Mounds or Almond Joy? Great taste or less filling?
If bitcoin is good at both those jobs, then it's probably got a bright future. If it's good at neither of them ... well, farewell, bitcoin, we hardly knew ye. In a previous column --
https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-12-22/what-is-bitcoin-good-for
-- and concluded that well, no, probably not. So today we ask whether it makes good money.
... Dispatch continues below ...
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So what of bitcoin as money? That's a complicated question, because money is an insanely complicated concept, even though it seems simple to us when we're exchanging $5 for an Extra Value Meal. But economists broadly agree on two core functions of money: It is a medium of exchange, and a store of value. ...
Which brings us to the thing that a lot of people seem to think bitcoin really is good for: hiding your money from the government. ...
Perhaps the biggest weakness, however, is that if bitcoin really turns out to be a good way to keep governments from controlling their economies and their citizenry, then governments will crush it. ...
... For the remainder of the commentary:
https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-12-27/bitcoin-is-an-implaus...
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