Even today, if there were no seat belt laws, most people would wear them because insurance companies would charge much higher rates for non-wearers. But those few people who didn't want to wear them would retain that freedom.
As for insurance companies, again, you miss the mark. Insurance companies only raise your rates for not wearing a seat belt when you get a ticket for not wearing one. Are you assuming that insurance companies wouldn't change their policies if the law was different? What you're describing sounds like an information asymmetry market failure. If I was an insurer and had no data from seat belt tickets, I would require that the car records detailed seat belt data, and that the customer shares these data. Right now it would be pointless because cops are checking instead. In either the seat belt analogy or SS, I think that people will respond to their incentives. If you give people a situation where they can assume all risks are mitigated on their behalf, of course they will be less careful. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk_compensationI'm not sure what your point is. I mean, I understand what you're saying, and it's not a bad idea, but have you thought about it from all angles? I suspect not. Consider... 1. Most everyone wears seat belts now. I have looked around when I drive, and I mean everyone wears seat belts. Most everyone feels more comfortable doing so. 2. The above is because of the seat belt laws. 3. People now put on their seat belts habitually, not even thinking about laws. They feel more comfortable doing so. Now, tell me how points 1, 2 and 3 above are less preferable than being forced to hand over monitoring of your daily life to a corporation? Furthermore, your proposal might as well include vehicle telemetry: speed, rate of acceleration, rate of deceleration, cornering speeds, records of tire replacement, records of vehicle maintenance, etc. Sounds just as bad as Big Brother. You're right about at least one thing... I haven't thought about it from all angles and certainly can't; my solution wouldn't even be the best one by now if it had to compete with all others. In my humble opinion it's preferable to have many insurance companies with varying policies and rates than one monitoring entity with one rate, one policy, and armed investigators patroling the streets. "Big Brother" isn't just collecting data, he's pulling me over and looking in my window. Just as bad? The differences are choice, competition, and nonviolence. I can easily escape an unfair insurance company. (It's kinda funny, most of the time I feel like these political analogies are inaccurate, but seatbelts turned out to be quite comparable to Social Security.) |
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Even today, if there were no seat belt laws, most people would wear them because insurance companies would charge much higher rates for non-wearers. But those few people who didn't want to wear them would retain that freedom.
As for insurance companies, again, you miss the mark. Insurance companies only raise your rates for not wearing a seat belt when you get a ticket for not wearing one. Are you assuming that insurance companies wouldn't change their policies if the law was different? What you're describing sounds like an information asymmetry market failure. If I was an insurer and had no data from seat belt tickets, I would require that the car records detailed seat belt data, and that the customer shares these data. Right now it would be pointless because cops are checking instead. In either the seat belt analogy or SS, I think that people will respond to their incentives. If you give people a situation where they can assume all risks are mitigated on their behalf, of course they will be less careful. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk_compensation |
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When it becomes commonly accepted that transmission nodes in the Bitcoin network are feasibly mainly to those with dedicated or specialized hardware in environments where network connectivity significantly exceeds what joe-sixpack has access to, I doubt that it will bounce back (to 'users run nodes') no matter what the theory says is possible. I've been assuming hardware/bandwidth is getting cheaper at a greater rate than the blockchain is growing. So it should become relatively easier to run a full client on normal hardware. Have I assumed wrong? Has anyone checked the math? |
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The problem with using means testing to deny benefits to rich people is that it could create perverse incentives on the margin. It's similar to how some people are better off staying on welfare/unemployment because getting a job would reduce their total income. Old people who are REALLY good at something might decide to stop very early if they value a dependable safety net. IMHO we should replace all this red tape with an equal basic income for all citizens, all ages. Since it doesn't punish anyone for getting a job, the resulting drop in employment isn't as big as you might guess. If this basic income isn't enough for everyone, the government could fund a public health insurance option. |
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Well, since no one else responded... yeah, you should probably move everything to a new wallet, just to be safe. This isn't really a good solution because it doesn't neccessarily prevent the problem from recurring, but it might just be a one-time thing.
If it DOES happen again, please post here.
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Offer and demand of bitcoins is mainly speculation (gambling) instead of a real use of the currency. This way the behavior of the price is uncertain (some periods of high volatility, others of high stability).
In order to fix this problem we need more entrepreneurs, engineers and developers (real work), and less economists, speculators and gamblers (zero-sum game).
I respectfully disagree. Speculation may be near zero-sum for the professionals, but for the rest of us they're adding liquidity. From liquidity comes stability. Remember that every time you sell something for bitcoin you're gambling on bitcoin's future value (minimum 10 minute bets). Economists are positive-sum. They contribute valuable ideas while asking little (if anything) in return. There are millions of ideas, projects and systems that were infeasible before Bitcoin (due to transaction costs) but now are fully feasible. The success of Bitcoin is our responsibility.
Now THAT I can get behind 100%! Coasian solutions spring to mind. Once we use cryptocurrency to efficiently handle externalities, it will be an enormous boon to humankind. |
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Do the math on that; 30 years life with no need to work in return for 3 extra years work. Isn't that a good deal?
Whether or not it's a good deal depends entirely on A) if you actually want to stop working B) if there are even better investments available If it is such a good deal, then it could be made optional and only a few fools would suffer, right?
And please forgive this science fiction tangent, but what if human life expectancy goes up a lot more due to a medical breakthrough? What if it becomes possible for the rich to live indefinitely? What if population growth worldwide plummets? What if a new financial system significantly limits which taxes are feasible? Who should foot the bill for these risks - the taxpayer or the investor? Because I don't trust a bunch of bloodthirsty short-sighted voters to make the best choices on my behalf. The next 30 years might get pretty damn confusing. |
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Could you put me down as CosbyCoin's sock puppet? I know what you're thinking, "isn't CosbyCoin BCX's sock puppet?" Yes. It's all very elaborate, you see, she's got puppets for her puppets.
~Explodicle~
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Yeah nice stop paying so when something bad happens to you you will be fucked.
If they aren't using those SS savings to buy alternative insurance and investment plans, don't they deserve to be fucked? It's not like we [USA] actually HAVE a universal health care system. The government leaves people to die on the streets all the time, even those who faithfully paid taxes their whole lives. Not that private insurance companies are much more trustworthy, but at least let people pick the least bad of several bad options. |
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Word to the wise: stop deluding yourself about SolidCoin. It failed the moment SC2 came out and nothing will ever change that. There's no shame in giving up on a bad idea.
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But citizens, Bitcoin is economic terrorism! It's no more "free speech" than sharing a stolen idea, or any number of totally valid analogies I can make up and argue incessantly. It's only a freedom if it doesn't infringe on the rights of others, and in this case it infringes on our right to your labor. Surely we can have sane limits on freedom when the only group being "oppressed" is a bunch of selfish aspy libertard jerks with low social standing.
[/sarcasm]
I really doubt that the populace, or the representatives they elect, will suddenly become logical and reasonable if cryptocurrency becomes important. They will start with the conclusion they want and work backwards. This wouldn't be the first exception to the bill of rights.
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If anyone could opt out, everyone would. It's mandatory because we all know it's just a Ponzi scheme.
GET BACK TO WORK, SLAVES!
ah... The Amish do not contribute to Social Security, nor Obama Care, nor Mortgage Insurance, nor etc... But they also don't partake of any benefits of Social Security. Correct, I saw that in ribuck's post. That's why I said "anyone", not "someone". |
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If anyone could opt out, everyone would. It's mandatory because we all know it's just a Ponzi scheme.
GET BACK TO WORK, SLAVES!
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IIRC Open Transactions features anonymous digital cash using blinded signatures. The catch is that the blinded signing has to be performed by an entity (the server) trusted by all involved parties. However, this blind signer doesn't need to know who is sending what to whom - you can operate "cash only" without so much as a pseudonym.
Bitcoins COULD still be tracked based on the size of inputs/outputs (like any other mixing service) but you could manually control the mixing process yourself.
Don't take my word for it, though... Most of what I've discovered so far is how much I have left to learn.
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How is a system where one guy repeatedly changes the inflation rate any more democratic? If anything, Occcu is more democratic, and that's a stretch. |
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(Disclaimer: I don't use Windows so I haven't tested this, it might not do anything) Restart your computer to make sure all Bitcoin programs are off. Open Notepad Paste in this text: Save it as "bitcoinrescan.bat" to the same folder as your bitcoin-qt.exe. Double-click on this new file to run it (it's a "batch" script) Bitcoin-Qt should now launch with the -rescan option. |
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Run bitcoind.exe or bitcoin-qt.exe -rescan .
Did you try this yet? |
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I agree with Blitz in that democracy can mean different things to different people. However, to ME it means that everyone at least has roughly equal power in the decision-making process, and that's not the case with Bitcoin. Your influence is dependent upon your contributions and ability. It would be silly to say a newbie has as much power as Gavin, MagicalTux, or Tycho. "Technocratic" is much more applicable.
Sure, we shouldn't market Bitcoin as undemocratic, but we shouldn't market it as democratic either. It's surely liberal and egalitarian, but its democracy is in a gray area at best. Boldly claiming how democratic we are will just spawn more semantic arguments like this and may even appear dishonest.
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I got LASIK and it's great - now I have perfect vision. Think of it this way... After your ordeal is over, cutting open your eyeball and shooting it with lasers won't seem so scary.
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