The former chief economist of the World Bank, Joseph Stiglitz Wants Bitcoin Banned.
“Bitcoin is successful only because of its potential for circumvention, lack of oversight,” Joseph Stigliz, currently a professor at Columbia University, said in an interview on Bloomberg Television today, as the cryptocurrency reached new all-time highs this week. “So it seems to me it ought to be outlawed. It doesn’t serve any socially useful function.”
Who gets to decide what is or isn’t a socially useful function?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fy16eIEux7U
Bitcoin, like it or not, is a result of innovative thinking. The free market seems to like it.
OK, bitcoin is a bubble. So are lots of things, predominantly because of groupthink by central bank economists and their nutcase academic proponents who collectively serve no useful function.
I’ll tell you what ought to be outlawed: The Fed.
Mike “Mish” Shedlock
Belief in Bitcoin is ideologically based and delusional. To claim 2/3 of world’s population can be saved and enriched by it is tenuous at best. The transaction costs are huge. You only need to look at the armada of transactional middle men that have sprung up to “facilitate” it’s use to realise that transaction costs will simply be taken by a new regime that’s is no better than the existing regime. The fact that central banks are worse is not a sufficient basis for embracing crypto currencies as some kind of nirvana. The claim that Stiglitz is an idiot is fair comment as he repeatedly makes idiotic comments. But using ideology and capital gains as primary justification for crypto currencies is also arguably idiotic
This advocate of “state money”that is “covered” by debt (a contradiction “per se” like “f***ing for virginity”), that is robbing people with Inflation, Quantitative easing, negative interest rates, that is meddling and manipulating markets , even abolishing market capitalism in the end , that interferes permanently with the property rights of the ordinary citizens (burdens it or makes them obsolete : See bail- ins, bail- outs), that helps criminals with State money =dollar- cash link to goo.gl calls for the state to “outlaw” cryptocurrencies, because he thinks “It doesn’t serve any socially useful function”. – and by that abolishing the ONLY WAY to have MONEY WITH THE SOCIALY MOST USEFUL FUNCTION: WEALTHCREATION. He should be educating himself link to goo.gl to get that “Krypto” is nessesary , to guarantee property rights,to create “trustless” peer to peer and instantaneous transactions, to exclude middelmen (like banks, frauds, borders or red flag legislations link to en.wikipedia.org)
Only with Cryptocurrencies can you integrate 2/3 of the world population (that is now “unbanked”) and that are excluded from the world economy , because of borders, high transaction costs, national moneys and state interference) that can solve the greatest problem of human kind namely “wealth creation” for the poor.
What a pity of the mental state our times and for “economics” as a “science”:morons like him are awarded with titles and key positions( “chief economists of the world bank” , “Nobel laureat”) where these ordained high priests of idiocy continue to lead our societies into the abyss.
WHAT PEOPLE do in their private lives is none of the governments business. In people’s economic lives as much as any other. WHY DO THESE PARASITES THINK THEY HAVE THE RIGHT TO REGULATE the whole world?
Stiglitz is a lot smarter than most of us here. Rather than calling him idiotic, can you provide any useful purpose of the bitcoin other than using it as a tax evasion and currency control evasion.
How funny… people here, who obviously are “somebody” are commenting on Stiglitz. You tell him! Maybe you could also quote from one of the books you’ve written on the subject or any other for that matter.
If “lack of oversight” = freedom, I suppose that the price of bitcoin is a good measure of how much people want to be free.
Right…. since it’s not under bank or corporation control something must be wrong with it. People fear things they cannot control or understand and this is a prime example.
Oh, another Nobel Laureate. Is he into the broken window fallacy, like Krugman is?
Stiglitz is nothing, cannot find any job if not backed by the establisment, so its normal to support his masters, and their money making system FED.
Outlawing things is the only thing that ought to be outlawed. Then we just might have a shot at resembling a free, civilized and decent society again.
Only a thief or robber could claim, that something helping people circumvent being robbed, has no socially useful function.
Remember when they outlawed Beanie Babies?
Stiglitz is a joke along with the rest of establishment morons.
Stiglitz formerly worked for the World Bank so this is not too surprising.
I saw this yesterday and was thinking this guy doesn’t actually know what he’s talking about, Laureate or not. There’s a number of misstatements in this piece, like money is only created by government and since Bitcoin isn’t created by government it can’t and shouldn’t exist…
Just another example of how deeply in bed economists are with politicians. I wonder what they would do under the conditions of the Crusoe Economics of a desert island.
But Mish, the man is a NOBEL LAUREATE, ergo he MUST know what is best for the unwashed.