Bitcoin Forum

Bitcoin is the first truly global currency. It can be used by anyone having access to the Internet, in any country.

Imagine now a world where salaries are paid in Bitcoin. This would enable us to compare salaries all over the world. And at least regarding work done online, like programming, graphic design and other typical freelance and digital work, it could help to establish a "global" salary level and thus help to balance inequality. [1]

There are freelance sectors where this already is the case, like our signature campaigns here, but also the Value4Value economy on Nostr, but it's still niches. Of course for this to work on a bigger scale than now, Bitcoin price would have to become more stable.

Also you could counter this argument that on freelance platforms the USD is used as a kind of substitute global currency, and international freelancers are competing there without country limits. However, there are several countries where the access to the USD is restricted, or where the conversion to a convenient rate is difficult. Thus a truly global currency like Bitcoin still could help to make salaries more "comparable".

What do you think?

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[1] You could of course argue that the inequality has also to do with differences regarding the education level. But even regarding "digital" work, there are still salary differences which can't be explained by this - i.e. where a work of similar quality is more expensive in some countries than in others.

I like and support the idea, but that might bring some sort of extra work if it's to be used in salary payment, and some times it could also cost a company to pay more or less depending on the current Bitcoin price as of the time of paying the worker who has earned from the company, unless the payment will be calculated in Bitcoin equivalent based on the current price in order to moderate and maintain a fixed value payment.

You make sense, but maybe it will happen if only it is possible that everyone will like bitcoin and agree to start using it.
A singular currency can really affect the way people pay for job done because it will give everyone the same sense of value of money. I think one of the very major things affecting the different amount of salaries paid to different individuals doing the same kind of job in different countries is based on the economic level in that country the lifestyle and cost of living.  

One thing we have to notice at all time is that Bitcoin was designed as the alternative currency to the fiat currency in world. And once bitcoin is used as the global economy which can be use to pay salaries and buying things in all the countries then the era of fiat has come to an end.

That's true of course. There are already platforms taking away the "hard work" in the salary payment mechanisms, like Bitwage. Of course for a fee (paid by the recipient of the salary). The OP also assumes an evolution towards a more stable price.

Volatility is already lowering but not enough for a widespread salary payment. We should stay for at least a year under 1.5%, maximum 2% (30 day average volatility) for that, and currently we're just above 3% (in 2023 the record low was recorded with 0,77%). Above all these panic dumps like in early August, but also FOMO phases like in early 2024 from time to time increase the value still a bit. Guessing from the chart, I estimate in the next crypto winter or early bull (maybe 2025 or 26) these conditions could become true.

https://talkimg.com/images/2024/08/16/7QbsD.png
Source: Bitcoin Volatility Index (https://bitbo.io/volatility/)


Exactly that. In some countries, the USD already has this function (for example, in South America), and in others the Euro (Eastern Europe). But Bitcoin has the potential to really unify this "sense of value".

Yes, there are of course some more differences impacting in salaries than just the education level.

For example, a programmer in a country like India may pay less for housing (rent/buying a house) than one in the US, and that lowers the minimum value they're going to accept for their work. However, rent prices at least in the bigger cities are also "globalizing" gradually, and this could become even more pronounced if Bitcoin becomes a truly global currency (imagine real estate websites showing the prices in BTC). This has of course also potentially negative consequence as it could lead to housing bubbles but in general this would be limited mostly to very attractive areas.

Like you said, this case is already present in certain sectors, but I don't think this would be fully implemented unless global prices of goods and services are also more or less uniform and are denominated in Bitcoin. Otherwise, what would prevail as the ultimate factor in salaries are the local standards of living.

Bitcoin helps level the playing field, yeah, but businesses and companies aren't unaware of the situation all over the world. And rather than help level the field further, they're actually making the situation worse. A company doesn't hire locals if that means a higher salary all the while there are abundant and exactly the same skills available overseas that are much cheaper.

Or, as far as actual experience is concerned, they may start giving equal salaries regardless of the locations of their employees but they eventually adjust them according to local standards if that means saving a considerable amount of operational expenses thereby increasing the revenue.

If this could balance inequality, I’m not sure given that, people around the world leaves under different economic conditions and as such, you can’t expect that people from nations with low economy can’t have the hope of a fiat salary or even try to measure up with people from mayors where the conditions of living is very fair.

If this could help in a study, well yes.

If you ask if this would be done or implemented, I’m not so sure. The fiat is an identity and symbolic currency and as such, countries around the world will always want to pay its servants in public offices in fiat.

Currency is just a currency regardless it's USD, Bitcoin etc it can't balance salaries across the world.

The recruiters are always discriminate their workers, they will hire and pay based on your ethnic, races, countries, and even your religions.

You know, company always try to reduce their expense as much as they can, so if they know you live in third world country where the minimum salary is $100/month, even you have high quality skill that worth $100K/month in first world country, they will try to offer at least $100/month instead of $100K/month.

Of course this is actually part of the problem: as long as there is more supply (of workers) than demand, then the price tends to "level down" to the cheapest offer. And then a worker from a "cheap salary country" would try to become the cheapest offer if they still get more than for a typical "offline" job in their country.

But I believe a "balancing" or "levelling" could occur as a very slow and gradual process. If the mentioned worker sees, in a global currency, what people from "richer" countries get for exactly the same work, then he may adjust his standards a bit to the upside. Of course this already happens with the USD as "de facto global currency", but with Bitcoin it would become even clearer. This is why I highlighted the "sense of value" in the earlier post.

Let's say (assuming we stay stable at current prices around $56-63k) a person from *typical poor country* is about to offer a programming job for 0.0003BTC / hour (about $15-20 in dollars) and sees that his US/European colleagues charge no less than 0.0008. Some would then be tempted to go up to 0.0004 or even 0.0005. Or they work on their language skills to not appear like "the typical cheap programmer from overseas" and then is able to even go to 0.0005 or 0.0006.

This is true unfortunately, at least in most jobs. But in a typical online freelancing platform setting, where I imagine Bitcoin first to thrive and earlier than in "offline" jobs, often you will appear as a "black box" to recruiters, with only an username (and a portfolio of your work) for example. On these platforms, the "levelling up" process for people from poorer countries I described above in the answer to Darker45 could take place gradually.
 

I think the forum is a unique case where it does not ask for your location data, therefore the standard of efficiency depends on the quality of the posts and there were big differences between accounts that get +$300 weekly and accounts that get less than $100 weekly.
Unifying salaries will not be good because it kills creativity and even in countries that give low salaries there are benefits besides the salary such as free housing or longer vacations or other differences.

A single currency and a universal minimum wage will make sense if the world is governed by a single government. Countries suffer from different levels of inflation, and the prices of goods and services are different. If I am paid the same salary as a worker in the US, I will be living like a king in my country while the workers in the US might still be struggling to survive. This is because the cost of living in my country is lower than in the US. Except for nations that have the same economic conditions, a uniform payment system will still lead to inequality.

Well if i think of such an idea as bitcoin as a world currency to create good wages and fight inequality is very alluring. It could set a truly universal standard for equal wages within industries and the freelance industry or digital ones. Should I say in this manner, a wage inequality equilibrium is created by equalizing global wage equilibrium. But we all knew that the high volatility of Bitcoin presently is a major stumbling block to it as a stable payment currency. Wide-scale adoption would require improvement of price stability. Moreover, if Bitcoin is going to replace USD or any other traditional currency, it should be considered that not all the communities can have equal access to cryptocurrency or infrastructure and for that some countries don't even legalize Bitcoin as of today. In spite of bitcoin, has the potential to play a part in inequality if it is going to decrease though practicably a number of challenges need to be addressed to improve it on a higher scale.

Let me remind you the unemployment rate is higher than ever all over the world and it varies from country to country which means people will be ready to do a job for less price assuming the quality is same, so salary is just decided by the demand and supply not really based on the quality of the service or product.

Equality in salary is only possible if every country comes under one governance and there's same minimum wage rule applies for anyone or else we have no way of attaining balance in salaries from different parts of the world.

I am not sure what prevents us for comparing the salaries in btc now. All you need is to convert said salaries to btc and compare.

And it's not like people who are getting paid small salaries now would paid more with bitcoin. There's no need to pay more if there are no laws protecting those workers and or costs of living are relatively low because there's no real infra that takes money.

If anything, this would just lead to getting paid less, because would you think that project manager would choose to pay more if they easily found an offer from overseas that 1/5th of it? Even when that offer is clearly running an immoral sweatshop. Imho that manager would probably chose slave labour if they get away from it.

Also there's nothing really preventing to pay with bitcoin in countries where USD is restricted or buy bitcoin with your salary, so i am not sure how global adoption of this would change things. Paying salaries with btc would be standard method already if benefits would outweight the negatives.

Governments won't most likely don't want to promote btc as a currency, or replacing / threatening the position of fiat money as they would fear market manipulation affecting their countries and there wouldn't be a way to protect them in crisis situations. Currently they can just print more money to go trough crisis.

It's also not economically sustainable to use BTC as cash, when you benefit more by holding it. Economy/capitalism works best when people consume and don't hoard their money.

Of course this is related to the economic level of the region or country concerned, the economic index is a reference in paying salaries.

Not only is the oppression of some companies also with the level of employee ability needs and make competition, to have a reciprocal price of the performance provided by the employee is different, so this cannot be generalized to get a balanced vision.

This isn't really that much of a big problem because salaries can never be equal everywhere. Look at Euro zone for example, you think people at Greece make the same amount of money as people in Germany does? Of course not, because they are not equal nations and they will never be equal and that's why it's different. If they end up putting something like this in the mix, like let's say there is a magical wand and we got rid of every nations fiat ever, and everyone uses bitcoin, it still means that some nations will have citizens making less, and some nations will make more.

This is why it will not balance it, maybe help a bit, but it will not be possible to balance it. Plus, we need to remember that it's only 21 million at max, when all is mined, plus we are talking about something that's going to get higher results and we are not going to see anything major changing neither because it is going to be tougher. So all in all, we should be warning the situation as much as we possibly could.

I have nothing concerning equality but if we look at this forum for example, there is a reason why some people on this forum don't participate in signature campaigns despite their reputations, their trust and personal relations with the forum founder and campaign managers. The pay rate looks too low to them compare to if they want to used that time to work per hour outside the forum, this is why I'm not sure a balance in salary scale will be difficult globally.

There is always different in payment even in online gigs and freelancing, many tech companies gives priority to some countries and consider there pay because their standards of living are more expensive than others. For example, if I get a company that will pay me to work as a social media handler $1500 a month, I will feel like I have won a jackpot but you can't used that to employ a person living in New York when they have a rent of atleast $2k a month to pay, standard of living and economic difference wouldn't make this feasible in my opinion

I'm not sure how being global helps address salary inequality. The US dollar isn't a global currency, but it can be obtained through exchange with other fiat currencies. When comparing salaries between Venezuela and the US, you need to consider their gross domestic products. The US produces significantly more per capita than Venezuela. I don't see how their currencies directly contribute to this inequality, aside from each central bank's interest rate policies. (For example, the Venezuelan bolívar is hyperinflated, while the US dollar is not.)

Bitcoin helps by providing a hedge against inflation. The issue isn't just that fiat currencies are limited to their nations' borders, but that people save in currencies that are constantly devaluing. However, while the difference might be less severe by saving in Bitcoin, it will still remain significant because, as I mentioned, not all countries produce at the same level.

I've seen freelancer platforms where the platform may ask for your location, the customers (those paying for work) only see the username and the portfolio - and the things the "workers" pubish about themselves in their profiles of course. There may be several models though.

Of course I'm not in favour of a completely unified salary. But for me for exactly the same work, a relatively similar salary or payment is justified despite the location of the worker. I don't understand what you meant with free housing/longer vacations, as that afaik are mostly benefits of high-salary countries (Europe ranks consistently in the first places when it comes to paid vacations).

Good points. However, I have some hope that these challenges tend to improve. For example, recently Bolivia has relaxed its crypto restrictions a lot, which should drastically improve the access to Bitcoin there.

Of course this is possible. But doing these conversions is not something people regularly do. I think the decision "which price I'm willing to offer to my customers" is influenced heavily by the "sense of value". And if a person from a low-salary country see salaries from people from other countries for the same work in the same currency (in this case, the BTC), then this can increase the "sense of value" they perceive for the task.

I believe this is happening for a long time already. Major companies do have the resources to compare salaries across the world, even if this needs lots of currency conversions. For the workers themselves this is much more difficult. Of course most workers are aware of the inequality, but often without consequences, and a part of the problem in my opinion is that the salary differences are not directly visible (only in some few cases like international freelancing).

I agree about worker protection, this is also a part of the puzzle. Bitcoin can only help with parts of this "balancing" task.

I read this argument a lot, but this changes dramatically if your income is also paid in BTC (in comparison to the situation where you bought the Bitcoins). If you have a steady influx of Bitcoins, then it's also easy to spend them. Transaction fees are of course an issue, thats why we need Lightning and other L2s.

Just the Eurozone is an example that such a "balancing" is happening, although very gradually. My example here would not be Greece, which had a tremendous economic crisis in the 2010s, but the Eastern european countries which adopted the euro like Slovenia, Slovakia or Estonia. The differences between their salaries and the Western European nations like Germany or France were much higher in the 90s and 2000s. Of course the Euro area is special as also the common market policies play a major role in that balancing, and thus also countries like Poland are "balancing up". But I think at least a part of the process can be attributed to the Euro, it's not casual that several countries are currently trying to join that area.

Of course there are many factors in play and the "amount of goods produced" does also impact in the salary level. As I wrote in another answer above I don't think Bitcoin or any other "global currency" can solve the inequality problem by itself.

My theory is that it however could help with some factors. Apart from the "sense of value" issue I mentioned above, I also think previsibility for foreign investment would be a major factor. You just brought up the example of Venezuela, and in Argentina (and other countries with a fastly devaluating currency) the situation is very similar: Many companies which would have invested if the currency was more stable are not doing this due to the "devaluation cost", i.e. constant hedging and possible currency exchange barriers, which impacts in the equation when they calculate the profit they could achieve with the investment. Getting international credit is also perhaps easier with a global currency, as the "devaluation costs" impact in the capability of a country to re-pay debt.

The idea is a great one and the only thing I see that can counter this your proposal is the economy situation in that country. We have different economy in all countries and that will be the major to play an important role in determining if the unified money paid in bitcoin even when more stable can help to make salary balanced across the world.

Those of higher calibre of work can still get paid higher because of their work professionalism, but if the economy situation of that country does not flow with that paid amount, it’ll destroy the goal of the unified payment in bitcoin. A professional freelancer in the USA when paid same amount as a professional freelancer in Nigeria, the one in Nigeria will see the worth of the money much more than that in the USA. The economy of the country will matter a lot and will obstruct the unified payment if enacted.

Salaries can be paid in Bitcoins but they will always be calculated in USD at first, that's how the economy works at the moment. There isn't a situation like, the salary of the senior angular developer is 1 Bitcoin a year. It's still in USD and Euros. You already prove what I said but in countries where access to the USD is restricted, mostly access to Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies are restricted too and on top of that, ISPs control everything in such countries.
Bitcoin is the best international payment method from point A to point Z all around the world where access to the Internet is possible. The usage of Bitcoin is there as a payment method but I don't think salaries will be calculated in it directly, without considering the USD value of Bitcoin.

I agree that it can help, with the matter of inequality. I've read from some other forums of freelancers that there are clients that do like to bring the contract outside the platform where they work, I guess everyone who works there is familiar with this kind of condition. And then, the clients ask their freelancers to get paid not in USD, not in PayPal, not in any other payment processor but in Bitcoin. The agreement between two parties will rely on the trust that they have for each other, or let's say the trust the freelancer has got to their clients. The only problem here is when the fees have also fluctuated a lot, a client won't afford to pay for the $100 fee when the freelance job is just around $10-$50. From there, that's how they'd start using alternatives like USDT with its cheap networks.

Again, the bottom line would be the local prices of goods and services. If the prices of goods and services greatly vary from one country to another, it is next to impossible for salaries to achieve a global standard.

Supposing there are two programmers with the same level of competence. One needs $20 a day for food while the other only needs $2. The latter would be more than happy to offer his/her services for $20/day. The former thinks this is unreasonable. Knowing the reality, employers would definitely hire the latter. The latter, however, cannot easily demand a salary according to a different standard because he/she is dispensable. There may be a handful that companies find worth bidding but the rest could easily be replaced. This is the real world case.

Although I agree that Bitcoin has the potential to unify our sense of value, what's happening right now is the opposite. Bitcoin adjusts to its local fiat equivalent. Unfortunately, Bitcoin advocates cannot insist on 1BTC=1BTC ideology because of so many factors which could be summed up as the fiat standard. For as long as the economy is based on fiat and is locally controlled, there can never be a global standard in prices and therefore in salaries.

Nope. Not at all. Am a big fan of BTC myself, but its volatility is annoying as hell sometimes which is why its unbalanced nature cannot really be utilised to balance global salaries across the world in my opinion.

On the other hand, USDT could manage to do that since it's almost always stable in nature except for a few crazy hiccups here and there.

Our forum has many jobs that pay in bitcoin, and I think this forum has the most jobs that pay in bitcoin. But at the end of the day, all of those bitcoins before being paid out to people will also be based on the value of USD at that time.

Everyone wishes that one day bitcoin could be used as the world's official currency but honestly, I don't think that will happen. Governments will never accept and use BTC even if USD dominance collapses. There will certainly be another national currency to replace it, bitcoin will never be the choice of governments.

The only possible way that this can come  to light is if Bitcoin becomes a legal tender world wide but if it's now, then such can not happen. I believe that the government of every country in the world might not approve for Bitcoin to become a legal tender. Personally, I don't even support for Bitcoin to be used in paying salary if we still have to spend on our needs using fiat money.

I'm gonna have to disappoint you. Bitcoin is not a “magic wand” that “saves you from all your troubles”. It's just another tool. I've already heard many fantasies about “bitcoin will save the economy”.... But as soon as we move away from fantasies, and start applying bitcoin to the real world, the real economy, real processes - everyone realizes that it is not realizable.

It's the same with wages. The idea is beautiful, but utopian. Just try to apply your idea for today's real world, such as it is, and you will very soon realize that it is unrealistic.... At least start with the fact that wages form the cost of production and try to make this process universal for the whole world, for different countries, different economies, different standards of living....

1.Any ideas on how to make the Bitcoin price more stable? ;D

2.What exactly are you proposing? The creation of a freelance platform, where the freelancers are paid in BTC only?
I remember several crypto freelance platforms being built in the last several years and none of them became the new Fiverr or Upwork.

3.Bitcoin is "digital gold", which makes the whole idea of spending BTC for goods and services(even labor costs) kinda difficult for implementation.

4.Bitcoin cannot magically "equalize" the salaries across the world. The process of equalizing the level of labor productivity can equalize the salaries. Another thing is the overall cost of living. People in some underdeveloped countries could live with 300 USD per month, while it's impossible for an American to live with 300 USD per month in the USA. That's why many programmers from Asia and Africa can offer cheap online services. Maybe equalizing the cost of living could equalize the salaries.

No possible.
Bitcoin is yet to reach the underserved communities in Africa. The technology around it cannot be understood by the folks who live there and there are too many barriers from the technology to the enabling environment and then policies. Even in those communities the use of fiat is not something they are used to. Some places even still use the trade by barter system. This is why I say, the despite the possibilities of Bitcoin in balancing salaries, these barriers to it must be overcome first.

It's not possible. Wages have to be measured and defined taking the local reality of each country and region due to living costs being different in each environment. If we had a global default wage for every graphic designers, for an example, it would be totally benefical for the ones living in third world countries, but heavily detrimental to the ones living in first world countries, considering the costs they pay to live there are much superior.

An example of that we can already notice right now are the signature campaigns. For someone living in USA or UK, the income they make from signature campaign on this forum is only an extra minor income compared to their total monthly budget, while someone from India or Venezuela engaged in the same activity can make a relatively comfortable living from it.

Moreover, to define wages artificially doesn't sound an efficient idea to fix the issue of underpaid employees. The market works around the supply and demand law, and that is what we have to keep in mind when choosing what we are going to work with. That is, to work in a demanded niche, which doesn't have enough supply of labor force yet.

Even if bitcoin is highly volatile, I don't think we should consider using USDT over it if any crypto currency is ever going to be used for global salary scale balancing.
 
It's better to be paid in bitcoin, and the payment is being calculated not just by bitcoin value or price, but the salary will be scaled by units of bitcoin. What the price might be at that time should not matter.
 
Let's not forget that USDT is a centralised asset that is controlled, adding to the fact that if anything happens to the issuer, it can be depegged and its value could drop to zero.

Yep, already wrote about that in the thread (perhaps not in your answer specifically). However, the title of the thread is help to balance the salaries, so the "salary/price comparability" can be only one factor among many.

By the way unfortunately living costs and salary level are not always connected. In many South American countries for example supermarkets are more expensive than in Europe, housing is cheaper but not by that much to justify a difference of 4-5 times when comparing the European salary level to the South American one. So we can say that living costs are one factor among many, too. Of course another factor is the supply/demand situation - workers from a country with higher unemployment rate tend to reduce their expectations.

What I want to discuss in this thread is to identify if there are mechanisms where Bitcoin or any other global currency can help to reduce inequality: like the "sense of value" issue and transaction costs.

While I agree that we're currently not in the situation, I dispute that Bitcoin never can be a global standard for prices & salaries. I already wrote in another answer that Bitcoin could relatively soon become as stable as gold (1-1.5% 30-day volatility). This would be approximately the case in 5 years if the reduction of volatility according to the index I quoted in one of the first posts in this thread continues. In this case we would probably begin to see prices in Bitcoin. Salaries would probably take a bit longer (outside of some freelancing niches), but could eventually follow.

There are actually a lot of approaches, but all tackle only small parts of that task. Some are related to the "communication about Bitcoin", while others are more "technical".

- Promotion of Bitcoin not as "get rich quick" scheme, but as an alternative to save and as a currency, to gradually reduce too speculative expectations.
- Instead of focusing so much on bull markets and the explosive profits you could make there, people and companies could focus on the opportunities the "crypto winters" offer to get cheap coins.
- More decentralized financial products based on Bitcoin, like options.
- More use as a currency for payments, because this boosts liquidity and liquidity is a big factor contributing to stability.

Main hope in my opinion is liquidity, which depends also on "currency usage", and indirectly on scalability. Probably liquidity improvements are the reason for the long term volatility reduction (in the short term there are still spikes) we are experiencing (see again the Bitbo Volatility Index (https://bitbo.io/volatility/)).

No. It's a purely theoretical discussion about one of possible future advantages of a "Bitcoin world" or "Bitcoin standard", the main question being if a truly global currency could help unifying the "sense of value" for work. Freelancing platforms like you mentioned can help, but with the current volatility are very likely only be able to cover some small niches.

Why? There is Lightning and there can be other second layers so technically there are relatively few barriers. The "difficulties" are all related to volatility (so see above). Spending if you can re-buy and get paid in BTC is not really a problem if the concern is about losing the opportunity to benefit from an increasing price.

Labor productivity is a good point and for sure has some influence. But it not always is the main reason for differences. If we stick to the example with the freelance computer programmer I outlined in other answers, then labour productivity would not influence the price of the work, as such contracts usually are priced "by finished work" while labour productivity is calculated by hour. And still there are often sharp differences in pricing depending on the country and sometimes even region the "worker" comes from.

So again, it's one factor but one among many. Regarding cost of living, see my answer to @Darker45 and others.

Exactly. The idea is that it could be a tool to combat some, not all of the mechanisms which produce inequality. See the word "help" in the title :)

This is of course true. There could be however a gradual process, where the salary balancing could first happen in urban environments and "globalized" sectors of the economy, and then trickle slowly into rural areas. In some poorer countries I know, the urban/rural differences aren't not that pronounced.

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To summarize a bit the discussion until now, I think we all agree that there are some factors determining salary inequality which can not be tackled by Bitcoin or a "global currency", at least not directly: Labour productivity, cost of living and things like infrastructure. And there's of course discrimination due to the origin of the workers often working "in the background" lowering the prices of workers of certain origin.

However, I still insist on that there are factors where it could help, mainly the "sense of value" area and transaction cost and perhaps other issues related to financial inclusion.

With the high number of unbanked population in some countries, Bitcoin could be a good medium for providing accessible financial services. Some persons have to travel a long distance just to have access to banking facilities where their salaries have been deposited. Paying workers with Bitcoin can bridge this gap.

Some of these unbanked populations have to pay high service charges if they want to have access to their salaries through middlemen. Bitcoin can offer cost-efficient financial services to the unbanked populace.

Using the services of some of these third-party financial services providers exposes users to the risk of scams and loss of earnings. With the secured financial services of Bitcoin fraud and scams are reduced since people now have full control of their wallets.      

This idea may be difficult to implement because some people are used to using fiat currency as a way to receive their salary or make purchases. Some lay people would find it difficult to accept a salary paid in bitcoin. But if this idea was put forward to people who like bitcoin then perhaps they would rationally support it. We also hear that some places are now using bitcoin as a salary payment, although the scope is still relatively small. About bitcoin becoming more stable and powerful I doubt this can happen, but some people would probably accept the idea much more easily.

But for those of us in the forum, the price fluctuations are what make bitcoin the best choice and I doubt that when prices become more stable bitcoin will be one of the best choices for some. The idea will certainly be an innovation and it is possible that in the future it will be used as a step of choice.

US is home to many big techs and what other countries does is from there own reference. So when we say Bitcoin should be use as global measure for freelancing, is Bitcoin generally accepted in the US? Another question is that is Bitcoin generally accepted globally for this measure to be taken into consideration? I'm not sure if this are really going to happen soon but if for instance US start this measure, I'm pretty sure other people will follow the same pattern.

Another challenge I think that might really affect this standardization is Bitcoin volatility, there are many companies that don't want to receive Bitcoin as value because of this. There is benefits in this volatility but honestly the other way round wouldn't be palatable for many tech guys especially when you have much to pay with your income.

Nice to read a reasoned and intelligent response from the author of the topic ! And understanding of the mass of problems that can not be solved by bitcoin. On the other hand - realizing the problem is half of the solution :)

In addition to the above nuances and problems, I would name one more - the lack of mass recognition of bitcoin as a means of payment or legal tender in most countries of the world. What do I mean by that ? So far, unfortunately or fortunately (we can't realize it yet), the bitcoin received by an ordinary worker will have to be ... yes yes yes yes, you guessed it - converted into fiat, local currency that can be used to buy milk, bread, meat and other everyday goods. And there begins the issues of commissions, deductions, “affiliate fees”, in a word, the loss of some part of the received value.

As annoying as it may seem, volatility is one of the many spectacular qualities of Bitcoin as we have it now. Bitcoin without volatility, I think many of us wouldn’t have been hodlers today and should we have a high predictability to it, a lot of people would have been about taking profit and investing these profit in some other gainful investments out there like real estates and acquiring properties.
I would agree with you that, it doesn’t get to balance off salaries as that wasn’t its purpose but, when it comes to ensuring free flow of business and by passing several protocols to get deals done, the roll of Bitcoin would be so much of a facilitator to this reality.

I agree about your point but here I want to give some details as this idea can be implemented but in developed countries because they are having well organized system which is helping their peoples for having use of advance technology and also mostly now they are having debit/credit cards rarely peoples are using case, so this is good for them their legal tender is strong about bitcoin because they are understanding all things related to this and their governments are also bringing policies for the development and improvement of their peoples lives.

In rest of the world, it's not going to work because we are having peoples not well organized, and their system is also not helpful with too many countries are having restrictions with we have no time frame about having things settled, and we will be having some good change for the peoples and their system with I personally love to have this system, but it's not going to be implemented in our country even in next few years.

You can always convert your Bitcoin or USDT to any currency you want, there's no problem at all. If there are employees that complain if they receive less in Bitcoin and propose to pay in USDT, the employers can just fire him and replace with the new one because there are many unemployed people out there.

And it comes a problem where people in your countries don't accept Bitcoin, if you sell your Bitcoin in centralized exchange or P2P, it force you to use banks service to receive your fiat and then there's no difference whether you receive in Bitcoin or fiat.

I believe that reaching to a full bitcoin world is literally impossible so these type of talks make no sense at all. What we should be considering instead is how much b2c could benefit from this, because online b2c world is major, it's incredibly big, look at amazon for example and that's just one website, sure the biggest one but still just one website, imagine every website like that, every ecommerce website, every place you can buy something, has crypto payment option, imagine how big that would be.

Instead of trying to balance the budget of everyone, we could just focus on b2c for crypto and suddenly we would actually have a greater result for sellers, because those sellers are not all from the same nation, and ecommerce is a global thing. This way you are opening every nation to every other nation and suddenly that could actually help with smaller nations to get a good amount of profit. We can finally see some hidden gems from other nations to grow.

Correct me if I'm wrong, what I could conclude from your explanation is how to make a global salary standard for various jobs all over the word, so it could help us in establishing same level salary for people around the world, especially in digital work, isn't it?

Well, for people who make money online, especially in beginner level, for them, this sounds like a good idea, but professionals who has worked for years and has honed their skills might disagree with this idea. My defend is because professional highly put their value in time and efforts to gain and maintain their reputation in their works, thus that's what makes their works are considered as more valuable or their works are seen as extraordinary. I wouldn't say that beginner freelancer are doing less excellent or less valuable works, but to gain and maintain reputation might take years and tiresome efforts.

Yes receiving salaries in Bitcoin will be a welcome development because every transaction of how salaries are sent to individuals will be visible in the blockchain but making comparisons about each persons salary is not necessary since works and the nature of services rendered are different and there is no way every one can earn same salary as regards to your statement about striking a balance in inequality that's if I didn't misinterpret you because each jobs are paid according to ranks, levels, profession and the work load of the job so there is no way that there's gonna be a balance in salary payments just like some of us are representing signature campaigns in the forum, payments differs according to ranks so it is in other jobs as well be it physical jobs or online jobs but if i get you wrongly you can still let me understand.

You are talking about bitcoin exactly as you would talk about the global reserve currency, or in fact any of the hundreds of other currencies that already exist. For all the hype that you may find in these forums, it actually creates extra barriers for the average consumer and they may not be interested in going through hoops or paying unknown fees when wanting to spend their money. You do have to be somewhat technically minded to have your own wallet or otherwise you are relying on exchanges, which is just the same as many bank accounts already out there. Anyone is free to accept their wages right now in bitcoin, but it doesn't mean that they want to do that.

They are open to technology and they are never allergic to the development of the times so that the lives of the people there also adapt faster. But to integrate payments using bitcoin in general it is still not possible because it is limited by the applicable rules. Except for some individuals who try to make purchases independently using bitcoin and that does not only happen in developed countries and even some people who live in developing countries also do this kind of thing.

In the future nothing is impossible because anything can happen and even when going back when the payment system using fiat currency was introduced it was also considered a taboo for the ancients. But the process took its course and of course was reinforced by some other reasons which were much more rational so that people at that time accepted it.

Now it can never be guaranteed how the payment system using bitcoin can be implemented globally. There are many restrictions that may not be able to be implemented especially for now every country has a legal framework regarding the payment system using fiat currency.

It would make a base salary but that's only going to hold online. It's not going to translate across the entire country which they are in, because their governments cannot sustain such rates yet with their current economies.

It is already happening without Bitcoin to an extent in the form of freelancing companies like Upwork and Fiverr - those just use the dollar instead of Bitcoin, and most freelancers would make the same conversion anyway when dealing with Bitcoin.

I really hate hierarchy.

It's really weird someone should being paid higher just because he already spent more years, but both of beginner and senior have a same workload, same job desk, same results etc. These seniors aren't fair though, sometime they will take a credit from the beginners' works in order to make him looks better. Imagine you work hard, your senior claim your work and you receive lower than your seniors.

obviously for it to work in a physical setting like within the country that's not like a freelancing job, it has to be that bitcoin has been accepted as a legal tender first in that region. for the freelancing jobs, it has a lot of advantages mostly for people that are residing in places where their exchange rate is very bad while comparing it to the dollar. the unite of bitcoin would have been an issue but since its mostly related to the dollar, that's already sorted out and if after receiving your pay you plan on converting from bitcoin to dollar and then to your local currency, though it might take a lot of time when you're in need of cash unlike when the payment medium is in your local currency, but the volatility of bitcoin and the difference in exchange rate will still serve to your own advantage.

I'm correcting you as you requested, because that's not what I meant :)

What I mean is mainly geographical differences, not differences regarding the quality of a work. Experience in a certain field is of course an item which can add value to a work, and thus I'm perfectly fine with an experienced worker having a higher salary and/or price (when talking about freelance work) than a newbie.

Legal tender is not necessary. Legal tender can help for that process because it forces everybody to accept BTC. But this acceptance can also happen without a legal tender status. Take Venezuela in the hyperinflation period, or Argentina a few years ago, where people were eager to receiver their salary in Bitcoin. However these periods were too short and the phenomenon, above all in Argentina, only limited to certain professions - and the USDT was more popular than Bitcoin.

The crucial factor is that goods must be priced in Bitcoin by merchants, and not "in the local currency or in USD converted to Bitcoin values". The condition for that is a relatively stable Bitcoin, which makes risk for merchants who price their products in Bitcoin manageable.

If I understood you correctly, then such an approach is still very unlikely to be able to correct the situation with salaries in the world. The fact is that each country is located in its own location, with its own climate, economy and history, and all this forms the quantitative value of salaries.
And even if we change the method of calculation to Bitcoins, this will not change much. After all, salaries are calculated from many factors.

Your idea seems good for freelancers and for those who getting paid in bitcoin but not suitable for the platforms and companies that are paying. For paying in bitcoins company should hold bitcoins and there is fluctuation in btc price and when the price is low and market is red the company will face huge and due to this the employee can face delays in their salaries.

I agree with this one, cost of living of a country and GDP will determine the minimum wage. The inequality that we seen in how different people from different country got paid might actually happen because of the differences in the living cost, for example 10$ in some country in Asia will get you 3 times meal in a day compared to America, the minimum wage there is far lower than in America, but that's enough to pay for the daily necessities.

This inequality also what people from West side of the globe has been utilized to travel to most Asian and African country for cheaper price

I agree with you. Because European countries are taking advantages from the poor asian people who sold their everything to work in big and advanced country. But that is also helpful for Asian countries because in Asia there is more poverty than in Europe and America and people are migrating from Asian countries to Western countries because they saw successful people who became successful in Western countries and before they were very poor and their parents took step for them to send them in Western countries. Now youth is crazy about that and that want to earn money at any cost and they are ready to work like labor but they want good about of salary.

Bitcoin is not a global currency, Bitcoin is a digital currency, I have a friend who opened a business and he pays employee salaries with Bitcoin, unfortunately the salary payment system only runs for three months, Then the employee's salary is paid back as usual, the reason is simple, the costs are expensive, it doesn't match what was expected.

Likewise with several other sources in terms of business in Bitcoin payments, they return to paying salaries as usual, for me Bitcoin is not suitable for salary payments, Bitcoin is very suitable for investment and trading, because the price of Bitcoin can change significantly.

We're so damn obsessed with the word "salary" we forget it's just a deal between two parties. You provide value, they give you something in return. Bitcoin's the equalizer. It doesn't care about borders, politics, or your grandma's favorite bank. People think stable means flatlining wages worldwide. Bullshit. Stable means the money in your digital wallet today is worth something tomorrow.

Bitcoin salaries? Sounds like a dream for digital nomads, right  "Oh, I'll just code from Bali and get paid in Bitcoin." Wake up, people. Bali's cheap, New York ain't. Taxes, living costs, they don't disappear just because you're getting paid in magic internet money. Bitcoin can make salaries more comparable, not perfectly equal. That's the reality check. You can do it, but it's gonna take a hell of a lot more than just wishful thinking

I already assume this does happen over decades, but not directly just from Bitcoin but as an overall trend change in the nature of economies.  Previously most work was arranged around a physical item made and moved around the world but its becoming far more true we have an economy of information and this is the value not so much physical.

Raw commodities will still matter and the elements we mine and refine will be the same as we've done for centuries or more.  Some parts of business will not alter and even change will be slow on those that do such as oil, usage will continue a century longer alongside various energy innovations and improvements.

Its also correct to say information is not new, services as a sector of the economy has long traded information even when it was done by telephone this in itself was a revolution to make the world smaller.  I think we do have to acknowledge that pre existing condition is increasing in its importance and size.    Now something like a 3D printer helps to emphasize the design of a product as most important with the elements to its production almost secondary and far more commoditized.

Final point is obvious, Bitcoin is an important expansion of this world growth, its part of why I think Bitcoin has good justification regardless of whats occurring with pricing for strong base line growth.    BTC is not just speculative or some temporary apparition but part of a process that begin long before its inception to enable anyone anywhere to do anything they are most capable of.
   The idea and the person is the most important part, enabling people in their work and abilities will make the world richer and I do hope more equal also.

It's a Good one tho but don't you think with the way the economy is going now that everyone has it in mind to own and start using Bitcoin cause I see the way most users in the crypto space regret of not knowing about Bitcoin a long time to have gone far in investing in it and so on, I also see how people make use of the symbol In every areas like making it visible for people to see.
But in the salary aspect i don't think it can really help cause looking at the value of fiat currency and rise in dollars Bitcoin can substitute for the both but there is need for a change  cause with time it takes only few to be able to pay up salary using Bitcoin due to the high rate.
I think for Bitcoin it has a high tendency of price alterations and if it's actually stable it'll be suitable for companies to be able to pay and balance up with salaries.

I'd say a "digital currency without geographic restrictions" would be the most accurate term, but "global currency" is serviceable enough.

Yep, currently Bitcoin "salaries" have their challenges and they may fit only for a small number of businesses, and thus it's only quite popular in the freelance world (e.g. through platforms like Bitwage).
It would be interesting though, if you know, which platform your friend used and how high the costs were. And were these transaction costs or more related to hedging?

Good points raised here. Bitcoin still fits into the scenario: if you have a highly standarized production structure (factories using similar processes across the world, services using the same software, etc.), then it becomes less justifiable why you are paying people from certain geographic regions less than those coming from other regions, at least if their productivity is equal. And an unified currency would show this to everybody.

It's of course not "magic" in no way (see also @slapper's post) but it can help, as already written, to influence the "sense of value".

Global salary comparison is an exciting use case for Bitcoin, but again, a number of very significant challenges are ahead. Although Bitcoin's adoption is on a very good path, especially in places like El Salvador and parts of Africa, it is still not adopted widely enough for a stable presence globally. The Bitcoin market is still quite volatile, that makes some employee and employer deemed Bitcoin as unreliable to be used as main currency for salary. While the volatility has decreased a bit in 2024, it's still an issue keeping Bitcoin from wide usability as a salary standard.

The adoption of Bitcoin in the freelance world is growing but remains niche. Although some platforms, like Nostr, together with a few freelance markets, are trying to experiment with Bitcoin for payments, also we can not ignore some blockchain based freelance platform that also help spread Bitcoin in the freelance world, like laborX and Crypto task. However USD still holds the most currency due to its relative stability and wide accessibility.  But theoretically, a global currency such as Bitcoin can help with that, practically speaking, we are quite far from seeing that on a wide scale, a more stable environment and greater access would be needed first.

What’s your solution? Do you think the seniors should get the same paycheck as the newbies?

That’s not how capitalism works. The seniors are getting paid better because the employers know that they bring more value to the company. Having more experience and knowledge pays more.

Today’s newbies will become seniors in the future too. So instead of complaining, you better get to work.

Moving is a great motive when you have more money and better life standards for even the same job. It doesn't even have to be a great job, you can be a washer, working in a restaurant and clean dishes all day and then you would still have a better life. This is why people move to Europe, a lot of my friends did, if you have a good job then it's even better.

But remember one more thing, even if you are wealthy in a poor nation, that's still not a good thing, because you still have burglars, thieves, murderers, kidnappers, or even just overall poverty all around you when you are richer than them, and you would rather live somewhere that is more modern and vilized. These days Europe isn't like that neither and they have plenty of crime issues, but at the very least it looks more modern and vilized on surface.

When it comes to Inequality then this would really be always be the difference in between to those who do earn less and more basing up on the position, education attainment, experience and on where you do live.
Lets say that we are focusing when it comes to online works or job then come to think that foreign companies or bosses would really be wanting on hiring up people on which they are living on 3rd world countries.
Why? because the labor cost is really that just too cheap in comparing into those 1st world and thats why you cant be able to say that you are earning more just because your employer do give out that said currency.
There's always those main difference in between things on which this is something inevitable and cant really be eradicated. As for Bitcoin payment or salary then it would be understandable that it could be equalled
but come to think that they would really be still that basing up on USD or fiat value which we know that there's still that gap or difference.

It would be an excellent idea if Bitcoin is used for payments and salaries around the world but I don't think that it will be possible for it to balance salaries across the world. The whole countries in the world have their own fiat currencies so Bitcoin is only accepted as an alternative currency, furthermore the standard of living differs from one country to another. Workers can be paid in Bitcoin but it will either be in the value of the country's fiat or USD. If the adoption of Bitcoin increases to the level that it is accepted for payments everywhere in the world and the gap between the rich and poor countries is not too much then Bitcoin can balance salaries across the world but it is near impossible for this to happen.

And this is true. Firstly, people will not perceive Bitcoin as something really valid, I mean a means of payment. They will exchange it for dollars immediately after receiving their salary.

And secondly, all countries have their own currencies, depending on many factors, and 99 percent of countries will not agree to exchange them for Bitcoins. Because they cannot control the first cryptocurrency.

A person with a low income in his country will look for opportunities to find a higher income by looking for a job on the internet that is paid with Bitcoin.
Why should it be measured by the balance of the salary that someone gets with fiat in this part of the world.
Bitcoin is unique, I think those who are paid their salaries with bitcoin are happier than with fiat because they can hold and use it for their investments.

In addition, a country will have different incomes that will be obtained by workers, both in government and casual workers. Also in some countries Bitcoin is only an investment tool because doing anything else will be against the laws that are applied because they have their own currency.

In different countries, companies will provide different salary offers to their workers. Even Google, Facebook, Apple, international giant tech companies, they don't provide similar salary offers to their employees at same positions but are working in different countries.

Salary is related to life standard and general income in a nation and companies are smart enough to adjust their salary policies in different countries.

In forum, we have different companies with their signature campaigns and their pay rates to users are different too.

Signature campaign: The lowest and highest payment BTC and USD in 2013-2022 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5403191.0)

At the moment I do not think we should all have the same salary because in every area the cost of living is different. If you live in San Francisco or NYC you cannot pay rent with 2000$, while in some countries rent would be only 250$ a month. Same with health care, food, etc.

In the first place, salaries shouldn't be based on location, but the offline cooperate companies have to pay according to the cost of living in your environment... Subsequently, the online market stopped to care about such a concept of payment. Thus, every online worker started earning as a result of the level of impact they add to the company or industry.

For example, freelancers on same level of skill like Op mentioned earn similar salaries regardless of their nation. In a nutshell, with bitcoin being the medium of payment the location of a writer in USA won't be enough reason to earn higher than another writer in Africa. What now determines their salary is the skill and impact they've got to offer for the brand.

that would work in a world where everything is equal. The point is that a freelancer in africa would be happy with for example 1000 usd for a month of work, and someone in the usa or europe would not do anything for that amount of money, bacause it wont be enough to make a living. And freelancers will compete on price. Years ago we had a job posted on some freelance site. First an offer of 3k from the usa, than 1.5k from GB, and then more and more offers from india, ending @ 400 or something.

It will be difficult for the world to accept bitcoin as a universal means of payment of salaries aside from the differences in the policies of different governments, which differs as to the ideology of these leaders, the volatility of the bitcoin market and its decentralization may not allow governments to adopt the bitcoin.

Bitcoin is a good alternative for the centralized system, but isn't meant to take over everything because as a technology, it comes with its own limitations. In the end many people who will receive their salaries in bitcoin will change it to their local currencies or at least stable coins to be able to use it in the market, which makes the process longer and tiring.

That's right. And this salary/price situation in certain places creates interesting moments. For example, I think it's cool to live in a small city where everything is cheap, and at the same time earn a big salary, best of all through remote work. Because a person with such a stack will keep more money for himself than someone who earns a lot, but also spends a lot. And as a result, the latter may have more expenses than earnings, I've seen such situations.

Signature campaigns are actually an interesting example for the effect I wrote about in the OP.

I don't know what you refer to exactly when you wrote "their pay rates to users are different", probably to the higher/lower payments per campaign, or per user group (Legendary, Hero etc.). But the payment is the same regardless of the geographic location of the user (which is unknown in most cases).

So with signature campaigns we have one of these rare cases where a payment for a service is already "balanced across the world".

This however has probably some consequences to the type of users who write for signature campaigns. While in some less developed countries a signature campaign payment may be already similar to the income of a regular job, in the US or Europe it probably is an additional income, or done by students for example. This is not so different for other simpler freelance work open for international applicants, like simple programming tasks to help IT students, SEO texts and so on.

The "balancing" effect was actually even more pronounced in the past when most signature campaigns even calculated their payment in BTC or other coins, and not in USD.