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Any facts to support these claims? As a counterargument: Deflation can solve number of problems like eliminate the debt spiral, restrain evergrowing unproducti

Any facts to support these claims? As a counterargument: Deflation can solve number of problems like eliminate the debt spiral, restrain evergrowing unproductive governments, restore the right to have savings for people and protect their future. Currently with centrally controlled inflation we are deprived of this fundamental right. This is from the merchant perspective: because of chargebacks my customers pay about 7% more for the service. 7% is to compensate direct cost of chargebacks, I don't count my time and cost of software I had to write to reduce fraud. The most painful however is that chargebacks are horribly immoral - the extra percent we all pay for everything goes to thieves who abuse the system.

Nursie 14y ago
Restore the right to have savings? What are you on? In a deflationary economy, holding cash (unproductive) enriches you off the back of the productive economy. It also values work yesterday more highly than work today, favours entrenched interests over newcomers etc etc. It's a great recipe for stagnation. Not to mention that, were it to go country-scale, the way BTC were allocated quickly at the beginning would create a new aristocracy that the rest of society (and future generations) could never aspire to joining. And chargebacks are not immoral. They are a fundamental part of the structure of trust built around ecommerce. Without that facility I would never trust a small vendor like yourself and you would be making $0
- gluczywo 14y ago
  "In a deflationary economy, holding cash (unproductive) enriches you off the back of the productive economy" It's a common misunderstanding. People confuse money with wealth. Holding cash does not enrich anyone. Money is useless if you can't spend it, so at some point hoarders will say: enough, it's time to use some life. At the end of the day, money is just numbers with the potential to convert it to comfortable life. My selfish side says: I wish more hoarders who collect numbers and don't convert it, so they don't use real world resources. They leave more for me! "values work yesterday more highly than work today" What's wrong with that? You can also say: values work today more highly than work tomorrow Most genuine credit card users are not aware of chargeback possibility and they rely on vendor reputation anyway. I wish you have to handle credit card payments so you realize how big burden it is and how it cripples the whole economy.
  - Nursie 14y ago
    Holding cash does not enrich anyone. In an economy with a deflationary currency, those holding cash get relatively richer without doing anything. So yes, it does. Most genuine credit card users are not aware of chargeback possibility Of course credit-card users are aware of the possibility of chargeback and contesting payments! Everyone gets screwed by dodgy online retailers sooner or later and goes through it. Where the hell do you live that consumer rights are so secret? it cripples the whole economy. No, it enables the whole economy, without the possibility of getting cash back from vendors, e-commerce would never have taken off. It's a guarantee to us, the consumer, that we will get what we pay for and even if you disappear off the face of the planet we won't be screwed. Sorry you don't like it. Everyone else really does, and we have learned through the whole of history that salesmen will rip us off at any given opportunity. Consumer protections are skewed in our favour, and they should be.
rayiner 14y ago
> Deflation can solve number of problems like eliminate the debt spiral, restrain evergrowing unproductive governments, restore the right to have savings for people and protect their future. Currently with centrally controlled inflation we are deprived of this fundamental right. "Right to have savings?" What a load of crap. Where in nature do you see ways to save value long-term without degradation? Many of a squirrel's acorns rot every winter. "Perfect stores of value" aren't natural, they're a wholly artificial construct with huge ramifications.
- lutusp 14y ago
  > "Perfect stores of value" aren't natural, they're a wholly artificial construct with huge ramifications. That's not true, there are plenty of natural examples that end up being rewarded by evolution. This is not a comment about the topic under discussion, only a correction. As one example, bears put on a lot of weight in the fall, a behavior that allows them to survive the winter. It's a perfect store of value. Studies show the hibernating bears (strictly speaking, it's not hibernation) don't waste anything -- the scheme nature has worked out is very efficient. Certain species of cicada hibernate for between 13 and 17 years between mating rituals. Their ability to survive in dormancy for so long is remarkable but true. They do it by not wasting anything. Examples abound. Again, this isn't a comment on the immediate topic, only the argument that it's not natural. It is natural.
  - rayiner 14y ago
    Those aren't examples of perfect stores of value. It actually takes energy to merely maintain the fat used to store the energy bears use to hibernate (after all, fat left outside a living body will quickly turn rancid). It might be an efficient store of value, but that's not the same as a perfect store of value. The overarching problem is that people see currency as something of value, as opposed to a proxy for goods and services. When you view currency for what it is--merely a proxy, the idea of currency that doesn't inflate is exposed for what it is--silly. Say I bake you a cake in return for weeding my lawn. With a non-inflationary currency, you're saying you should be able to "bank" that cake, and come back and ask for it 5, 10, 50 years into the future. With a deflationary currency, you're saying you should be able to "bank" that cake, and come ask for two cakes in 5 years or 5 in 10 years.
tptacek 14y ago
You mean to say, it protects the future of people so long as they don't have a lease or a mortgage, or debt of any sort, or long term contract obligations.

Nursie 14y ago

Restore the right to have savings? What are you on? In a deflationary economy, holding cash (unproductive) enriches you off the back of the productive economy. It also values work yesterday more highly than work today, favours entrenched interests over newcomers etc etc. It's a great recipe for stagnation. Not to mention that, were it to go country-scale, the way BTC were allocated quickly at the beginning would create a new aristocracy that the rest of society (and future generations) could never aspire to joining. And chargebacks are not immoral. They are a fundamental part of the structure of trust built around ecommerce. Without that facility I would never trust a small vendor like yourself and you would be making $0

gluczywo 14y ago
"In a deflationary economy, holding cash (unproductive) enriches you off the back of the productive economy" It's a common misunderstanding. People confuse money with wealth. Holding cash does not enrich anyone. Money is useless if you can't spend it, so at some point hoarders will say: enough, it's time to use some life. At the end of the day, money is just numbers with the potential to convert it to comfortable life. My selfish side says: I wish more hoarders who collect numbers and don't convert it, so they don't use real world resources. They leave more for me! "values work yesterday more highly than work today" What's wrong with that? You can also say: values work today more highly than work tomorrow Most genuine credit card users are not aware of chargeback possibility and they rely on vendor reputation anyway. I wish you have to handle credit card payments so you realize how big burden it is and how it cripples the whole economy.
- Nursie 14y ago
  Holding cash does not enrich anyone. In an economy with a deflationary currency, those holding cash get relatively richer without doing anything. So yes, it does. Most genuine credit card users are not aware of chargeback possibility Of course credit-card users are aware of the possibility of chargeback and contesting payments! Everyone gets screwed by dodgy online retailers sooner or later and goes through it. Where the hell do you live that consumer rights are so secret? it cripples the whole economy. No, it enables the whole economy, without the possibility of getting cash back from vendors, e-commerce would never have taken off. It's a guarantee to us, the consumer, that we will get what we pay for and even if you disappear off the face of the planet we won't be screwed. Sorry you don't like it. Everyone else really does, and we have learned through the whole of history that salesmen will rip us off at any given opportunity. Consumer protections are skewed in our favour, and they should be.

rayiner 14y ago

> Deflation can solve number of problems like eliminate the debt spiral, restrain evergrowing unproductive governments, restore the right to have savings for people and protect their future. Currently with centrally controlled inflation we are deprived of this fundamental right. "Right to have savings?" What a load of crap. Where in nature do you see ways to save value long-term without degradation? Many of a squirrel's acorns rot every winter. "Perfect stores of value" aren't natural, they're a wholly artificial construct with huge ramifications.

lutusp 14y ago
> "Perfect stores of value" aren't natural, they're a wholly artificial construct with huge ramifications. That's not true, there are plenty of natural examples that end up being rewarded by evolution. This is not a comment about the topic under discussion, only a correction. As one example, bears put on a lot of weight in the fall, a behavior that allows them to survive the winter. It's a perfect store of value. Studies show the hibernating bears (strictly speaking, it's not hibernation) don't waste anything -- the scheme nature has worked out is very efficient. Certain species of cicada hibernate for between 13 and 17 years between mating rituals. Their ability to survive in dormancy for so long is remarkable but true. They do it by not wasting anything. Examples abound. Again, this isn't a comment on the immediate topic, only the argument that it's not natural. It is natural.
- rayiner 14y ago
  Those aren't examples of perfect stores of value. It actually takes energy to merely maintain the fat used to store the energy bears use to hibernate (after all, fat left outside a living body will quickly turn rancid). It might be an efficient store of value, but that's not the same as a perfect store of value. The overarching problem is that people see currency as something of value, as opposed to a proxy for goods and services. When you view currency for what it is--merely a proxy, the idea of currency that doesn't inflate is exposed for what it is--silly. Say I bake you a cake in return for weeding my lawn. With a non-inflationary currency, you're saying you should be able to "bank" that cake, and come back and ask for it 5, 10, 50 years into the future. With a deflationary currency, you're saying you should be able to "bank" that cake, and come ask for two cakes in 5 years or 5 in 10 years.

tptacek 14y ago

You mean to say, it protects the future of people so long as they don't have a lease or a mortgage, or debt of any sort, or long term contract obligations.