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I am actually a rare breed excited about the potential about cryptocurrency here on HN. That said, when I go through your example, I don’t see much difference f

I am actually a rare breed excited about the potential about cryptocurrency here on HN. That said, when I go through your example, I don’t see much difference from the current system despite the illusion that it’s different. > appropriate taxation of a transaction is built into a smart contract So, like sales tax. Which we have uniform and open laws for. Or income tax. Which we have uniform and open laws for. > everything from deciding on how to spend that tax money to the project management for the efforts those tax dollars fund is conducted in the open Tax laws are public knowledge. So are spending decisions. For example, the infrastructure bill that just passed. Anyone can see exactly the allocation of funds to where. > by people who have achieved various types of stakeholder status So, senators. Which we have already. Or direct democracy without senators, which the founding fathers (US-specific) agreed was bad because most people do not understand how taxes and budgeting work. I want to be convinced that this is somehow different from the current system, but any example I see is either the same (but looks very different) or worse (this part is arguable, but I don’t think proportional voting on tax law would end well. Most people would certainly just end taxes if given the choice with little regard to the long-term consequences of this.)

jollybean 5y ago
"So, like sales tax. Which we have uniform and open laws for. Or income tax. Which we have uniform and open laws for." Laws are not mechanisms, proof of transaction, records etc.. 'Smart Contracts' as something unassailable in courts are ridiculous obviously. But 'smart contracts' that facilitate micro-transactions, every day purchases, and flow through the system without human interaction seem like a good idea. Imagine when you buy that thing on your Business Visa, and the 'smart contract' is signed, sent to head office, sent to your accounting software, balanced, money in your bank account immediately etc.. All with a series of signed elements. I understand that's not exactly what it's supposed to look like, but that's the kind of thing I see happening. While you could say 'there should be a standard for that' it might be that the standards are not nimble enough, and a more generic 'start contract' system could work to tie it all together. And maybe importantly: to skip VISA and classical banks while we're at it.
- uncomputation 5y ago
  > Laws are not mechanisms This part is interesting, the idea that enforcement and legislation are one in the same. However, for taxes, this would only just prevent tax fraud, right? There’s not really “mechanisms” for taxes. Congress passes the laws. You follow them when you file your taxes, or you may be audited later and fined/jailed. > to skip VISA and classical banks while we’re at it Loan pools and such are interesting, basically community lending. I’m not sure how much we could skip VISA. It’s a payment processor. You need someone to submit your transactions to nodes. In reality, they are of course going to charge a fee because they can make money. Just like VISA. One advantage is I guess they won’t have VISA’s prudish objections to certain kinds of transactions.
- throwawaygh 5y ago
  > Imagine when you buy that thing on your Business Visa, and the 'smart contract' is signed, sent to head office, sent to your accounting software, balanced, money in your bank account immediately etc.. All with a series of signed elements. This already happens at every company I've ever worked for, modulo the "in your bank account immediately" part. But that's down to how cash flow works, which is fundamental to most businesses/industries and can't be solved by anything other than time travel or teleportation. No amount of crypto is going to change the fact that the restaurant needs to sell a completed before it can pay the cook for their prep work. Even if bank transactions were immediate, most people would have to wait until their next paycheck to get reimbursements. The underlying technology is a 90s relational database, some html/javascript/php, a bunch of java, and probably some cobol somewhere. > And maybe importantly: to skip VISA and classical banks while we're at it. As much as I hate the privacy invasion of cc companies and banks knowing everything I buy, the idea of my entire financial life being published on a public chain is waaay more creepy. Like most normal humans, I am mildly creeped out by big companies knowing things about me but would be seriously angry if my manager, pastor, or mother-in-law knew those same things.
  - jollybean 5y ago
    'The way it works today' is a bit cludgy and there's actually no reason you couldn't have the reimbursement instantly. The 'non tech' reason would be related to internal approvals, but with the right tech, it would be streamlined. It's also possible that the government could get some of their taxes right away. Obviously not in call cases due to varying accounting issues, but it could work. FYI there's no reason for 'all your transactions to be on the blockchain' - that's just the way it works today but that can change.
rileyphone 5y ago
> Or direct democracy without senators, which the founding fathers (US-specific) agreed was bad because most people do not understand how taxes and budgeting work. To be fair, people were MUCH dumber back then, and the capability to access information was a modicum of what it is today. Direct democracy was also impossible back then given the slow speed of communication and population distributed across vast territory. Today, I don't think it's fair to paternalize the general public as such - we have the system we have due to legacy and inertia, not its merits.
- Negitivefrags 5y ago
  People were NOT dumber in the past. This is very obviously the case if you take time to read old books. A lot of the supposedly dumb things that people believed in the past were actually quite well supported and derived theories with the information they could get at the time. Of course there were a lot of people who believed dumb things on blind faith, but this is just as true today as it was then.

jollybean 5y ago

"So, like sales tax. Which we have uniform and open laws for. Or income tax. Which we have uniform and open laws for." Laws are not mechanisms, proof of transaction, records etc.. 'Smart Contracts' as something unassailable in courts are ridiculous obviously. But 'smart contracts' that facilitate micro-transactions, every day purchases, and flow through the system without human interaction seem like a good idea. Imagine when you buy that thing on your Business Visa, and the 'smart contract' is signed, sent to head office, sent to your accounting software, balanced, money in your bank account immediately etc.. All with a series of signed elements. I understand that's not exactly what it's supposed to look like, but that's the kind of thing I see happening. While you could say 'there should be a standard for that' it might be that the standards are not nimble enough, and a more generic 'start contract' system could work to tie it all together. And maybe importantly: to skip VISA and classical banks while we're at it.

uncomputation 5y ago
> Laws are not mechanisms This part is interesting, the idea that enforcement and legislation are one in the same. However, for taxes, this would only just prevent tax fraud, right? There’s not really “mechanisms” for taxes. Congress passes the laws. You follow them when you file your taxes, or you may be audited later and fined/jailed. > to skip VISA and classical banks while we’re at it Loan pools and such are interesting, basically community lending. I’m not sure how much we could skip VISA. It’s a payment processor. You need someone to submit your transactions to nodes. In reality, they are of course going to charge a fee because they can make money. Just like VISA. One advantage is I guess they won’t have VISA’s prudish objections to certain kinds of transactions.
throwawaygh 5y ago
> Imagine when you buy that thing on your Business Visa, and the 'smart contract' is signed, sent to head office, sent to your accounting software, balanced, money in your bank account immediately etc.. All with a series of signed elements. This already happens at every company I've ever worked for, modulo the "in your bank account immediately" part. But that's down to how cash flow works, which is fundamental to most businesses/industries and can't be solved by anything other than time travel or teleportation. No amount of crypto is going to change the fact that the restaurant needs to sell a completed before it can pay the cook for their prep work. Even if bank transactions were immediate, most people would have to wait until their next paycheck to get reimbursements. The underlying technology is a 90s relational database, some html/javascript/php, a bunch of java, and probably some cobol somewhere. > And maybe importantly: to skip VISA and classical banks while we're at it. As much as I hate the privacy invasion of cc companies and banks knowing everything I buy, the idea of my entire financial life being published on a public chain is waaay more creepy. Like most normal humans, I am mildly creeped out by big companies knowing things about me but would be seriously angry if my manager, pastor, or mother-in-law knew those same things.
- jollybean 5y ago
  'The way it works today' is a bit cludgy and there's actually no reason you couldn't have the reimbursement instantly. The 'non tech' reason would be related to internal approvals, but with the right tech, it would be streamlined. It's also possible that the government could get some of their taxes right away. Obviously not in call cases due to varying accounting issues, but it could work. FYI there's no reason for 'all your transactions to be on the blockchain' - that's just the way it works today but that can change.

rileyphone 5y ago

> Or direct democracy without senators, which the founding fathers (US-specific) agreed was bad because most people do not understand how taxes and budgeting work. To be fair, people were MUCH dumber back then, and the capability to access information was a modicum of what it is today. Direct democracy was also impossible back then given the slow speed of communication and population distributed across vast territory. Today, I don't think it's fair to paternalize the general public as such - we have the system we have due to legacy and inertia, not its merits.

Negitivefrags 5y ago
People were NOT dumber in the past. This is very obviously the case if you take time to read old books. A lot of the supposedly dumb things that people believed in the past were actually quite well supported and derived theories with the information they could get at the time. Of course there were a lot of people who believed dumb things on blind faith, but this is just as true today as it was then.