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Was just listening to the Twitter call with the President. To clarify questions from the last thread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27408683 https://news

Was just listening to the Twitter call with the President. To clarify questions from the last thread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27408683 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27408683): - https://twitter.com/nayibbukele/status/1402442597235310596 https://twitter.com/nayibbukele/status/1402442597235310596 Is the full text of the bill in Spanish and English - You can pay your taxes in Bitcoin. - All merchants must accept Bitcoin. Merchants can instantly convert to USD at time of payment if they wish. - Citizens can use any software they like to transfer Bitcoin, they are not required to use the Strike app. - They are creating a $150M USD / BTC Reserve fund to allow citizens to easily convert between the two currencies.

el-salvador 5y ago
Salvadoran here... I'm kind of losing track of all the changes that have been happening recently here recently. When most of the country wakes in about five hours, they will wake up with a new law that adds a new legal tender in 90 days. The most detailed explanation of the plan, has been in a foreign language - English -, in a twitter space this midnight and a Bitcoin conference in Miami last Saturday.
- TimJRobinson 5y ago
  Haha, meanwhile we're all jealous that your country can go from proposal to passed bill in 3 days. Imagine how much the USA could accomplish if congress worked that fast..
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  - sennight 5y ago
    Yes, what we need more than anything else is more laws - generated at a rapid rate.
  - jpmoral 5y ago
    OP posted a reply about why that might not be the best thing. Wonder why they deleted it.
  - tinus_hn 5y ago
    Passing bills quickly is not typically a good sign. Look at North Korea for an extreme example.
  - bhupy 5y ago
    That's possible in the USA also, you just have to do that at the State and Local levels (which are comparable in population and ideological homogeneity with El Salvador anyway). The USA isn't a unitary state, so it won't move as quickly as unitary states. It's a federal state that shares sovereignty with its constituent States, and the Federal government is necessarily slower than the State and local governments. This is true of all federations, including Canada, Australia, Switzerland, Argentina, and Mexico.
- slim 5y ago
  Thank you. I was looking for a salvadorian to explain the situation. How is your president perceived by the general population ? He seems to have an interesting personality
  - el-salvador 5y ago
    I'll try to be neutral: A recent poll by the UCA University shows that he is perceived as a positive change[1] by 87.5% of the sample / general population. [2] [1] The previous government was unpopular. [2] https://m.dw.com/es/uca-el-salvador-mayor%C3%ADa-aprueba-gesti%C3%B3n-de-nayib-bukele/a-57773641 https://m.dw.com/es/uca-el-salvador-mayor%C3%ADa-aprueba-ges... The government's most popular measures so far are the vaccine roll out plan (best in Central America), the food packages distributed during the pandemic and gifting a laptop to every high school student. Stimulus checks came some months but were available for many businesses and employees. Part of his popularity comes from a well planned media strategy that includes multiple traditional and social media channels. Radio, tv, government owned media, government controlled media, twitter, tiktok, facebook, instagram, official government social media, new state owned newspaper, new state owned news program, social media influencers, youtubers, memes. [4] I would say that 2/3 of every trending topic I see is government related. [3] Criticism comes from many organizations which are concerned about authoritarian tendencies. A summary of the opposition point of view would be https://elfaro.net/en/202105/columns/25464/This-Is-How-a-Republic-Dies.htm https://elfaro.net/en/202105/columns/25464/This-Is-How-a-Rep... [3] Sample video of pro government twitter feed generated by twitter's default suggestions https://mobile.twitter.com/mxgxw_alpha/status/1398440458733375489 https://mobile.twitter.com/mxgxw_alpha/status/13984404587333... [4] https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/05/25/bukele-autocrat-playbook-tiktok/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/05/25/bukele-aut...
  - randomname2 5y ago
    Another explanation from a salvadorian: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/nt8hi6/im_from_el_salvador_and_im_here_to_clarify_some/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/nt8hi6/im_from_el_...
nly 5y ago
Requiring merchants to accept it must be a boon for salesmen selling PoS devices... I'm sure they'll take this opportunity to extort as much as they can out of retailers.
salamandersauce 5y ago
So cash based merchants must accept bitcoin? Who decides the going rate for conversion between bitcoin and USD? The merchant? The government?

el-salvador 5y ago

Salvadoran here... I'm kind of losing track of all the changes that have been happening recently here recently. When most of the country wakes in about five hours, they will wake up with a new law that adds a new legal tender in 90 days. The most detailed explanation of the plan, has been in a foreign language - English -, in a twitter space this midnight and a Bitcoin conference in Miami last Saturday.

TimJRobinson 5y ago
Haha, meanwhile we're all jealous that your country can go from proposal to passed bill in 3 days. Imagine how much the USA could accomplish if congress worked that fast..
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- sennight 5y ago
  Yes, what we need more than anything else is more laws - generated at a rapid rate.
- jpmoral 5y ago
  OP posted a reply about why that might not be the best thing. Wonder why they deleted it.
- tinus_hn 5y ago
  Passing bills quickly is not typically a good sign. Look at North Korea for an extreme example.
- bhupy 5y ago
  That's possible in the USA also, you just have to do that at the State and Local levels (which are comparable in population and ideological homogeneity with El Salvador anyway). The USA isn't a unitary state, so it won't move as quickly as unitary states. It's a federal state that shares sovereignty with its constituent States, and the Federal government is necessarily slower than the State and local governments. This is true of all federations, including Canada, Australia, Switzerland, Argentina, and Mexico.
slim 5y ago
Thank you. I was looking for a salvadorian to explain the situation. How is your president perceived by the general population ? He seems to have an interesting personality
- el-salvador 5y ago
  I'll try to be neutral: A recent poll by the UCA University shows that he is perceived as a positive change[1] by 87.5% of the sample / general population. [2] [1] The previous government was unpopular. [2] https://m.dw.com/es/uca-el-salvador-mayor%C3%ADa-aprueba-gesti%C3%B3n-de-nayib-bukele/a-57773641 https://m.dw.com/es/uca-el-salvador-mayor%C3%ADa-aprueba-ges... The government's most popular measures so far are the vaccine roll out plan (best in Central America), the food packages distributed during the pandemic and gifting a laptop to every high school student. Stimulus checks came some months but were available for many businesses and employees. Part of his popularity comes from a well planned media strategy that includes multiple traditional and social media channels. Radio, tv, government owned media, government controlled media, twitter, tiktok, facebook, instagram, official government social media, new state owned newspaper, new state owned news program, social media influencers, youtubers, memes. [4] I would say that 2/3 of every trending topic I see is government related. [3] Criticism comes from many organizations which are concerned about authoritarian tendencies. A summary of the opposition point of view would be https://elfaro.net/en/202105/columns/25464/This-Is-How-a-Republic-Dies.htm https://elfaro.net/en/202105/columns/25464/This-Is-How-a-Rep... [3] Sample video of pro government twitter feed generated by twitter's default suggestions https://mobile.twitter.com/mxgxw_alpha/status/1398440458733375489 https://mobile.twitter.com/mxgxw_alpha/status/13984404587333... [4] https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/05/25/bukele-autocrat-playbook-tiktok/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/05/25/bukele-aut...
- randomname2 5y ago
  Another explanation from a salvadorian: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/nt8hi6/im_from_el_salvador_and_im_here_to_clarify_some/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/nt8hi6/im_from_el_...

nly 5y ago

Requiring merchants to accept it must be a boon for salesmen selling PoS devices... I'm sure they'll take this opportunity to extort as much as they can out of retailers.

salamandersauce 5y ago

So cash based merchants must accept bitcoin? Who decides the going rate for conversion between bitcoin and USD? The merchant? The government?