Bitcoin: Order without Law in the Digital Age

Central Claims

• Bitcoin can be a currency beyond state control, and thus stable
• This is a good thing

State v Stable Money

• Problematic Objectives
• Problematic Side Effects

Problematic Objectives

• Boondoggles
• "Nation states can manipulate their currency, printing more money to fund projects for their favored supporters."

Problematic Objectives

• Confiscatory Taxation
• “Savings are confiscated as the value of their accumulated savings depreciates in the face of rising prices”

Problematic Side Effects

• “Citizens become less certain of money as a store of value and economic growth suffers”
• "by the end of 2015, the Argentinian Peso had become so devalued that major international corporations for a time stopped accepting transactions in the currency.”
• Panic & Inflation

Anything new here?

Boondoggles & Taxes

Inflation and Panic (& Gold Clauses)

State Toleration (& Gold Clauses)

Toleration & Commitment

• The central problem is state commitment. See John O. McGinnis & Michael B. Rappaport, Symmetric Entrenchment: A Constitutional and Normative Theory, 89 VA. L. REV. 385, 388-89 (2003)
• Consider state cryptocurrencies to solve the commitment problem

Bitcoin: Order without Law in the Digital Age

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