[misnamed]

A deflationary asset class encourages hording, not spending or using in other ways. There's also no real limit to the number of crytocurrencies that might appear later (see: MySpace replaced by Facebook), unlike gold. As for inflation: safe government bonds have historically kept up with that over the long haul, so no big loss there.

[spurgu]

Imagine a society not based on consumerism and quarterly report increases. Gasp!

Back in the day people used to get interest (covering more than inflation) from holding money in their bank accounts. What's changed?

[brightball]

My understanding has always been interest rates. Interest rates on savings accounts are supposed to be slightly lower than interest rates on loans with the bank taking a profit in the middle.

Home loans used to be much higher, in the 10-15% range and you could get 6-7% on your savings account.

With home loans in the 2-3% range, those margins aren't feasible anymore.

But that's probably an old understanding. I'm sure there's a lot more financial wizardry to it now.

[spurgu]

I'm not an economist either but what you said makes sense. We instead nowadays have tons of various fees on our bank accounts so the return ends up being negative. And we're supposed to accept that this is fine and normal? Economy is booming? Give me a break.

This is why creative solutions like bitcoin, if not (necessarily) directly solving anything, do give pause for thought, and maybe shine some hope for a non-corrupt (immutable) system of money.

I need to read up on whether a deflationary currency/economy would really be an issue, or if it just wouldn't work with how things are currently set up.

Edit: And yes, it's a complex issue with no outright easy answers. Doesn't hurt to think about it though.

[nmlnn]

https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/-/media/boe/files/quarterly-...

[misnamed]

Rates have been declining for years (decades, really), but so has inflation. The spread hasn't actually changed that much.

> Imagine a society not based on consumerism and quarterly report increases. Gasp!

I have literally no idea what that would look like or how Bitcoin would play a role. I guess hodlers who bought early would be rich and normal people poor?

[spurgu]

Hmm. Ignore the existing coins for a moment, let's just imagine that starting today everyone gets their salaries paid in bitcoin and that's the only currency you can use.

Assuming the value will slowly (and for the sake of argument steadily) increase, would consumption and innovation stifle to a halt and everyone turn into hodlers?

Saving money would become attractive yes, and loans would become expensive or unrealistic (depending on the rate of deflation).

And companies/businesses would value a steady and solid stream of revenue/profit over hysterically chasing constant growth.

Would this really be so disastrous and why?