mapesdhs :
govts. can print money to devalue the currency (and meanwhile, with low interest rates, one's savings devalue by several percent p.a.), or simply swipe cash out of accounts if they want to (as happened in Cyprus), hence why the EU wants all member states to switch to cashless economies asap.
Nooo...
The reason they want members to go cashless (and this is cash as in coins and paper bills) is because cash is almost exclusively used by criminals as well as by workers in the informal economy to dodge taxes. They are
not advocating for members to switch to cryptocurrencies, which (potentially) aren't much better than cash, in these ways. What they want is for people to electronic payments, like credit cards, debit cards, phone-based payments, etc.
And I think the situation with Cyprus had largely to do with foreigners placing assets in Cypriot banks, BTW.
mapesdhs :
bit_user :
There are lots of good places on the internet to learn about crypto currencies. Apparently, this forum is not one of them.
It seems one can say the same about what the Fed is, what it does, why, where it came from and who controls it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsqGR31zoVA
Thanks for illustrating my point. Like I said:
bit_user :
There's a lot of crazy misinformation out there, but some common sense can help you steer clear of most of it.
Economic policy is a fairly deep subject and the mechanisms of currency control are complex enough that it's easy to misunderstand or for conspiracy nuts to misinterpret or misrepresent. Don't believe everything you read on the internet (or see on Youtube). That's really all I can say.
mapesdhs :
bit_user :
The currency supply is controlled by the US Federal Reserve, which is an independent government entity precisely to prevent such problems ...
8D Dream on.
About as independent as you can get, really. Like the US Supreme Court, the board of governors is nominated by the Executive and confirmed by Congress. It's not secret - it's a public institution. The act establishing it set forth its mandate: maximizing employment, stabilizing prices, and moderating long-term interest rates.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Reserve_System
mapesdhs :
It certainly doesn't operate policy in the interests of the American people. If it did, the US would be in a much better state than it is atm, without the Chimerica dependency, enormous public debt (chalk that one up to Obama), huge number of people out of the labour pool entirely, etc.
Wow. Just what
won't you blame on the Federal Reserve? They have very few tools in their toolbox (basically just monetary policy) and that only gets you so far. They're basically just a reactive body.
You can debate the merits of their mandate, and you can debate whether their policies and decisions have optimally fulfilled it, but Congress are the ones running up the federal debt and making the vast majority of economic policy. And even trade agreements like NAFTA and TPP have to be ratified by Congress.
A lot of crackpots like to blame the Federal Reserve for just about anything, because it seems mysterious and removed. The antidote is simply to educate yourself about what it actually is and does, and look to respected economists for discussions about their policies, rather than people who'll say anything to further their political agenda.
Nutters often like to rail against "unelected judges" and "unelected bureaucrats", when our campaign finance system has effectively made the elected politicians the most corrupt ones. I suspect that's actually what bothers many of them - that more of government can't be bent to serve the will of their paymasters.
mapesdhs :
As for the GPU price spike, let the market do what it does best.
The problem is that supply is fairly inelastic. I'd imagine the fabs used to make them are fairly backlogged, so increase in production of the GPUs probably can't happen right away. Furthermore, if I were AMD or Nvidia, I would probably try to move up production I was planning for later in the year, but wouldn't necessarily increase production totals by much. If the craze dies down, they don't want to suddenly be stuck with more inventory than they can sell before the next generation of GPUs arrives.
mapesdhs :
Irony is of course, eventually the usefulness of 1070s for mining this c.c. will fade and finally drop off, and when that happens they'll get dumped on the used market, so those delaying now can snap them up.
Of course, that'll further dampen demand for new ones, so a double-whammy if excess GPUs would be produced now. But my other thought is that I don't know how much I'd trust a GPU that's been burning away in a mining rig. At the very least, its fan might need to be replaced.
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