Exactly. I can't see how a CBDC is all that different from a debit card, which I'm guessing most of us have and use. Our employers are not carrying bags of straight-cash-homie to our banks every 2 weeks. The questions to me are how is the currency controlled/managed/regulated and what are the laws around privacy and usage to protect the …
Exactly. I can't see how a CBDC is all that different from a debit card, which I'm guessing most of us have and use. Our employers are not carrying bags of straight-cash-homie to our banks every 2 weeks. The questions to me are how is the currency controlled/managed/regulated and what are the laws around privacy and usage to protect the consumer, etc.
But I do tend to agree that some entity will try to use it for total control. That seems to be the Davos/Brussels crowd's primary goal. I'm just thankful we seem to have some folks on the side of team US that don't want to relinquish their control over global financial markets. I honestly think the Davos set thought they could just take it without a battle.
(IMO, we also all need to realize there never has been - and there never will be - a non-corrupt government. And there will always be government. There will also always be currency. Currency arose as an effective solution to a genuine problem. To assume anything else is utopianism along the lines of the Marxists or the anarchists. IMO, it's about how we, the governed, keep those two things [corruption and gov't] under control.)
Totally agree. The only government that isn't corrupt is the government with no people.
I do think another potential issue of concern is how they attempt to require people to access the CBDC. If they want people to have things implanted in their body, that will be resisted, as will retina scans and the like.
Keep it simple and continue using cards and there shouldn't be that many problems. But corruption rejects simple ...
Agree again. No implants of any kind. You have to half-wonder if that was at least one goal of the covid shots - to get people to relinquish the concept of bodily autonomy for things like CBDC implants or other even more nefarious things. Though, yeah, they're going to try and we need to be ready to die on that hill b/c I don't think there's any coming back from having one's own body become the mechanism for traceable financial transactions.
CBDC is *nothing* like a debit card! It's programmable and would be the end of financial freedom. Period. CBDC and digital id must be rejected by the people.
Explanation and examples in this great animated video:
No, they are not that different. Who holds the liability is the primary difference. A bank account can be "programmed" as well. Despite what that video says, the gov't can currently track digital purchases. They are not anonymous today. And, currently, over 90% of transactions are digital. Only a small amount of our money supply is even issued as physical money.
As with all technology, the key is being vigilant about the laws governing the use of the technology. That, and maintaining the existence of physical money so that not all transactions are electronic and truly private transactions can be maintained.
Interesting, thanks for sharing. Generally I really like Brownstone's takes on things. They were awesome WRT covid.
Keys to me seem to be: what are the laws/regs around it, are there other available alternatives to keep it from being the only currency, and of course, no implants. Implant means it's not "your card" anymore in the sense of a debit card, but you, physically, who made the purchase.
Otherwise, everything everyone is saying about CBDCs could also be said of their bank accounts. If the gov't wants to track it today, they can. If they want to "program" it, then can (garnishing wages, e.g.). The vast majority of our currency today is already electronic. (I'd also point out the things being said today are the exact same things people said about debit cards when those were rolled out: the end of paper money, no more financial freedom, government going to use it to track purchases and take guns, mark of the beast, etc.)
For fairness of argument, I'd also point out there are lots of valid, good reasons for CBDCs and even to track purchases. Catching drug or human traffickers, for instance. But, also financial/economic ones. Lots of bad as well.
I tend to look at tech as tech. It's a tool. Someone is trying to solve for a real problem (just as currency itself was someone's solution to the problems with bartering); and someone else is going to try to use that solution for harm. Like a hammer, it's what we do with it that matters. It's legal to use a hammer to pound nails and such; it's illegal to use it to pound someone's head.
If it were possible to remove, on the banking side, the human element CBDC's would be more efficient; humans introduce the potential of abuse. As we noted, cash should work with the system but shallow people have a need to try and control others, that's a concern. Cash, or lack there-of, opens that door.
Well, we're all focusing on the retail side, which is a tiny portion of the reason financial institutions want CBDCs. The retail (consumer, aka us) side is an almost insignificant amount of $$$ to be a consideration. Financial institutions want CBDCs b/c of the greater efficiency and how much money that saves them/makes them on large dollar institutional level transactions, international transactions, and so on. That's why I say they are happening and there is good reason for it (in addition to legitimate use in policing gangs, drug/human traffickers, etc.)
But, like I said, the bad actors in gov't, NGOs, "philanthropists," and so on are going to try to take advantage of it and use it for the types of things people are rightly worried about. It would be nice to remove the human element, but probably never going to happen.
Mix AI with everyone using a CBDC for everything and you're one step away from hell on earth, IMO. To avoid that, privacy laws - and maintaining alternative forms of currency - should be the primary concerns.
IMO, our biggest threat is our populace. It concerns me that so many millennial and gen Z folks don't seem to have even a concept of privacy anymore, much less an expectation or a the desire to ensure gov't respects it. So, that would be the main hurdle in ensuring the gov't maintains Constitutional privacy laws. As always, the biggest risk to us is us.
Exactly. I can't see how a CBDC is all that different from a debit card, which I'm guessing most of us have and use. Our employers are not carrying bags of straight-cash-homie to our banks every 2 weeks. The questions to me are how is the currency controlled/managed/regulated and what are the laws around privacy and usage to protect the consumer, etc.
But I do tend to agree that some entity will try to use it for total control. That seems to be the Davos/Brussels crowd's primary goal. I'm just thankful we seem to have some folks on the side of team US that don't want to relinquish their control over global financial markets. I honestly think the Davos set thought they could just take it without a battle.
(IMO, we also all need to realize there never has been - and there never will be - a non-corrupt government. And there will always be government. There will also always be currency. Currency arose as an effective solution to a genuine problem. To assume anything else is utopianism along the lines of the Marxists or the anarchists. IMO, it's about how we, the governed, keep those two things [corruption and gov't] under control.)
Totally agree. The only government that isn't corrupt is the government with no people.
I do think another potential issue of concern is how they attempt to require people to access the CBDC. If they want people to have things implanted in their body, that will be resisted, as will retina scans and the like.
Keep it simple and continue using cards and there shouldn't be that many problems. But corruption rejects simple ...
Agree again. No implants of any kind. You have to half-wonder if that was at least one goal of the covid shots - to get people to relinquish the concept of bodily autonomy for things like CBDC implants or other even more nefarious things. Though, yeah, they're going to try and we need to be ready to die on that hill b/c I don't think there's any coming back from having one's own body become the mechanism for traceable financial transactions.
CBDC is *nothing* like a debit card! It's programmable and would be the end of financial freedom. Period. CBDC and digital id must be rejected by the people.
Explanation and examples in this great animated video:
https://rumble.com/v1o5meq-johnnys-cash-and-the-smart-money-nightmare.html
No, they are not that different. Who holds the liability is the primary difference. A bank account can be "programmed" as well. Despite what that video says, the gov't can currently track digital purchases. They are not anonymous today. And, currently, over 90% of transactions are digital. Only a small amount of our money supply is even issued as physical money.
As with all technology, the key is being vigilant about the laws governing the use of the technology. That, and maintaining the existence of physical money so that not all transactions are electronic and truly private transactions can be maintained.
I came across this a few minutes ago
https://brownstone.org/articles/moneys-grim-future/
Interesting, thanks for sharing. Generally I really like Brownstone's takes on things. They were awesome WRT covid.
Keys to me seem to be: what are the laws/regs around it, are there other available alternatives to keep it from being the only currency, and of course, no implants. Implant means it's not "your card" anymore in the sense of a debit card, but you, physically, who made the purchase.
Otherwise, everything everyone is saying about CBDCs could also be said of their bank accounts. If the gov't wants to track it today, they can. If they want to "program" it, then can (garnishing wages, e.g.). The vast majority of our currency today is already electronic. (I'd also point out the things being said today are the exact same things people said about debit cards when those were rolled out: the end of paper money, no more financial freedom, government going to use it to track purchases and take guns, mark of the beast, etc.)
For fairness of argument, I'd also point out there are lots of valid, good reasons for CBDCs and even to track purchases. Catching drug or human traffickers, for instance. But, also financial/economic ones. Lots of bad as well.
I tend to look at tech as tech. It's a tool. Someone is trying to solve for a real problem (just as currency itself was someone's solution to the problems with bartering); and someone else is going to try to use that solution for harm. Like a hammer, it's what we do with it that matters. It's legal to use a hammer to pound nails and such; it's illegal to use it to pound someone's head.
If it were possible to remove, on the banking side, the human element CBDC's would be more efficient; humans introduce the potential of abuse. As we noted, cash should work with the system but shallow people have a need to try and control others, that's a concern. Cash, or lack there-of, opens that door.
Well, we're all focusing on the retail side, which is a tiny portion of the reason financial institutions want CBDCs. The retail (consumer, aka us) side is an almost insignificant amount of $$$ to be a consideration. Financial institutions want CBDCs b/c of the greater efficiency and how much money that saves them/makes them on large dollar institutional level transactions, international transactions, and so on. That's why I say they are happening and there is good reason for it (in addition to legitimate use in policing gangs, drug/human traffickers, etc.)
But, like I said, the bad actors in gov't, NGOs, "philanthropists," and so on are going to try to take advantage of it and use it for the types of things people are rightly worried about. It would be nice to remove the human element, but probably never going to happen.
Mix AI with everyone using a CBDC for everything and you're one step away from hell on earth, IMO. To avoid that, privacy laws - and maintaining alternative forms of currency - should be the primary concerns.
IMO, our biggest threat is our populace. It concerns me that so many millennial and gen Z folks don't seem to have even a concept of privacy anymore, much less an expectation or a the desire to ensure gov't respects it. So, that would be the main hurdle in ensuring the gov't maintains Constitutional privacy laws. As always, the biggest risk to us is us.
Anyway, thanks for the conversation!