Bitcoin: Is it economically damaging?

[Shu]

Some of you may not be aware but for a few years now there has been a new form of currency that has taken precedence. What is Bitcoin? Well it is a form of currency, created in 2009, that takes out the "middle man"/banks and works pretty much like peer to peer. You can use it to buy merchandise online without any transaction fees (like banks are making a killing off of here in the states). Also it is a huge form of anonymity, where yes transactions are taken down in a public log, but the user's name can be shadowed completely.

You maintain these bit coins in a digital wallet. Bit coins these days are mined via complex mathematical algorithm solving. When it first started Bit Coin users made millions of dollars, these days the bit coin market place is flooded so the inflation of merchandise has gone up (making stuff cost more per coin).

The major question though, do you think there could be any hazards of taking out the middle man/banks and their transaction fees? If we as people traded without anyone else touching our money? Let's hear it..

 

[Galadín]

The BitCoin is a decentralised, highly volitile and untracable "currency" which undermines national tender and has the huge potential to threaten sovereignty (in regards to the tight link between a country and the need to control, regulate and manage its currency). Is this economically damaging; definitely. Economies are built upon the premise of this sovereignty and the economic growth everyone harps on about these days relies on the managment of currency. Having an unregulated virtual currency economy grow unchecked and founded upon knee-jerk anti-regulation doctorine not only increases the chance of adverse econimic conditions but also gives the opportunity to these high-risk commodity traders to manipulate markets and undermine consumer protection.