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by knlinux 3037 days ago
> If those investments fail, you will now probably have to use government funds to bail them out in some way

Why? Should I then expect the government to bail me out after I lose all of my money in blackjack, provided that sufficient amount of people do the same.

Sadly, the current party seems to be on the side of stepping in and bailing people out. Once in the instance of mortgages in Swiss Franc, which were taken in '00s (CHF went up significantly several years after, raising people's morgage almost 200%), and secondly in the case of a big precious metals investment scam (Google "Poland Amber Gold").

Those government interventions will not come without costs. A direct one resulting in forcing the taxpayers, which were responsible with their money, to reimburse those who were willing to risk taking a 30-year loan in a foreign currency, or those hoping for high profits from a precious metals investment by a company that existed for less than 2 years on the market. Another cost, which I would argue is a more dangerous one, is destroying fiscal responsibility in the mentality of people. In case of something like bitcoin it can only lead to three outcomes for the ruling party: a) the government regulates/defames or bans bitcoin, b) government accepts that it will need to bail people out at some point once a sufficient amount of "victims" complain, c) it loses the next elections to a party which will promise a bitcoin bail-out

> (...) to try to educate it's indirect users on good and bad risks to take to try to make the country as a whole more competitive. (...) Given that attribution would probably have reduced it's effectiveness, I can see why the country would want it without attribution.

I agree with the educational part, but not so much with the argument for concealing the attribution. The moment someone spills the beans, the smell of "propaganda" can have an opposite effect, i.e., "they did that in secret, because they want to keep taxing you through inflation, that's how powerful bitcoin is".

1 comments

> Why? Should I then expect the government to bail me out after I lose all of my money in blackjack, provided that sufficient amount of people do the same.

Well, if the issue grows to such a great scale then bailing people out saves the society, and the economy, from collapsing.

We can argue about the methods, but, well, I guess it's noble that the gov/bank tries to warn people about the dangers of cryptocurrencies. If you look at any crisis around the world the central banks usually turned a blind eye. Then it ended with bailouts and defaults. So, better to act before, than after.

It wouldn't collapse for those that did not gamble, why should they pick up the tab? What later stops the gamblers from gambling again once the non-gambles pay off their debt, other than outright ban of gambling. Then replace 'gambling' with any voluntary risk vs gain activity.