[PragmaticPulp]

The core Bitcoin holders don’t want more coins, so it won’t happen. Simple as that.

The real elephant in the room is that new crypto currencies are being printed left and right. We may have a finite number of Bitcoin (in a couple decades) but one look at the list of crypto currencies will show that the number of crypto coins in general continues to explode at a phenomenal rate.

[isoskeles]

Why do the core Bitcoin holders have much to do with the decision? The decision here would be made by the miners, right? They have a different set of incentives from people who hold BTC. Maybe I’m missing something, I don’t see how holders and miners have the same interests.

[px43]

First off, miners need to ensure that the coin they're mining retains value, so they need the network effect of the entire economy. No miner is going to make a decision that makes the underlying thing that they are mining worthless.

Even if 80% of miners wanted something, if it was egregious enough, like a change in supply, then no one would go along with it. Ecommerce companies like Coinbase etc would just ignore the fork and keep going with the remaining 20% of miners whose heads are screwed on straight.

Those 80% of rebel miners who are burning all that energy, and have all that sunk cost in hardware, would be stuck mining a nothing coin that no one wants, and would lose everything almost immediately.

Remember, miners have sunk costs. They, more than anyone, need the coin to retain value. Their incentives are incredibly aligned with everyone else in the ecosystem.

[entropea]

Miners have never had any reason to change anything in Bitcoin and will not change anything to this day. They make profit just by doing nothing and have been for a decade. They've held Bitcoin back from being much better than it is almost solely.