It's still really hard to use bitcoin as a regular currency

[BADecker]

Government Monopoly Money vs. Personal Choice in Currency

For more than two hundred years, practically all of even the most free market advocates have assumed that money and banking were different from other types of goods and markets. From Adam Smith to Milton Friedman, the presumption has been competitive markets and free consumer choice are far better than government control and planning – except in the realm of money and financial intermediation.

This belief has been taken to the extreme over the last one hundred years, during which governments have claimed virtually absolute and unlimited authority over national monetary systems through the institution of paper money.

At least before the First World War the general consensus among economists, many political leaders, and the vast majority of the citizenry was that governments could not be completely trusted with management of the monetary system. Abuse of the monetary printing press would always be too tempting for demagogues, special interest groups, and shortsighted politicians looking for easy ways to fund their way to power, privilege, and political advantage.

The Gold Standard and the Monetary "Rules of the Game"

Thus, before 1914 the national currencies of practically all the major countries of what used to be called the "civilized world" were anchored to market-based commodities, either gold or silver. This was meant to place money outside the immediate and arbitrary manipulation of governments. Any increase in gold or silver money required private individuals to find it profitable to prospect for it in various parts of the world, mine it out of the ground and transport it to where it might be refined into usable forms, and then mint part of any new supplies into coins and bullion, with the rest made into various commercial and industrial products demanded on the market.

The paper currencies controlled by governments and their central banks were supposed to be issued only as claims to – as money substitutes for – quantities of the real gold or silver money deposited by members of the society in banks for safekeeping and the convenience of everyday business in the marketplace.

Government central banks were meant to see that the society's medium of exchange was properly assayed and minted, and to monitor and police private banks and itself to make sure that the "rules" of the gold (or silver) standard were properly followed.

Bank notes were to be issued or deposit accounts increased in the banking system as a whole only when there had been net additions to the quantity of the commodity money within the economy. Any withdrawals of the commodity money from the banking system was to be matched by a decrease in the total quantity of bank notes in circulation and in deposit accounts payable in money.

Read more at https://www.fff.org/explore-freedom/article/government-monopoly-money-vs-personal-choice-currency/.

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[Ucy]

I think things are improving if he truly did this much with Bitcoin. It would get much better in the future with Bitcoin or any Cryptocurrency atall. Don't forget Crypto have no government backing and advertisements yet It keeps getting lot of attention.

[digez]

it is still HARD to use it in everything, you can still use it through selling and buying gift cards, but still there are still few restrictions, and it won't be with directly using gift cards, with the current number of shops, restaurants and websites accepting bitcoin is still minor specially in real-world (i.e offline).

[deisik]

How will this problem be solved? Will the lightning network allow for reasonable transaction fees with small purchases?

It will likely allow even free of charge payments

If a shop is going to accept Bitcoin, it would make sense for them to run a Bitcoin (or Litecoin, for that matter) full node and open payment channels. If you make a lot of transactions, you can do the same, and then you can make any number of transactions paying next to nothing or just nothing. If you are using a web wallet (like Coinbase), they will likely establish a payment hub themselves, and you won't have to pay anything (just as you had been paying nothing before the fees skyrocketed)

[xSkylarx]

Yeah I think it is really hard to be used as a regular currency,
The fee for every transaction is high right now even if you are just going to send a small amount of money.

[Obito]

Yeah I think it is really hard to be used as a regular currency,
The fee for every transaction is high right now even if you are just going to send a small amount of money.

Very true, I also experienced the high fees. I used to move my fund on block chain to another wallet but because of high fees I didn't make it so that I will wait for the decrease of fees in order to move my funds. Anyway, I think for now it is really tough for us to use bitcoin as regular currency due to few complications however it will not last so long and soon we can use it with ease.

[pathapoddo]

Yes,it's really hard to use bitcoin as a regular currency. In my country there are just few people know about bitcoin..And few stall, bar,store are use accept bitcoin.so, I can say it will take long time or can say some time use as a regular currency. Thank you.

[ArIMy11]

http://www.cnbc.com/2017/06/14/despite-its-record-setting-surge-this-year-its-still-really-hard-use-bitcoin-as-a-regular-currency.html

With all the hysteria around bitcoin surging to records and possibly being the currency of the future, CNBC decided to put it to the test. Can one person live off of bitcoin for a week?

New York City may have thousands of restaurants and bars, but only a handful accept bitcoin. We made a lot of calls and reached out to several vendors to see if they accept the digital currency. We also leveraged "bitcoin maps" online which were not entirely accurate.

However, we did find a few eateries in the city who accept the currency directly - two of which are French restaurants in lower Manhattan – Le Village and La Serine.

Another option was using Gyft.com, a site which allows you to purchase gift cards to Whole Foods, Starbucks, CVS, etc with bitcoin. This ended up being tremendously helpful, but also highlighted the reliance one must have on third parties to get by just on bitcoin.

Another big takeaway? Using bitcoin can be costly. Checking out at vendors that accept bitcoin is relatively easy, but I ended up spending on average 40 percent more versus paying with dollars or credit card because of unfavorable conversion rates and additional transaction fees. For example, my ice cream sandwich at Melt sold for $5, but with bitcoin I ended up spending the equivalent of more than $9. The gift cards also come with additional fees.

Transportation is also a challenge. As a reporter, I am constantly on the go, traveling around the city to meet sources, attend conferences and coming on air from different studios. The subway is typically how I get around town. Unfortunately subways do not accept bitcoin. Same story for yellow taxis.

The third option (besides walking) was ride-sharing apps. I was able to buy an Uber gift card via Gyft.com. I ended up spending more time and money taking this roundabout way, but at least I could travel from downtown to the upper west side without walking.

After a couple days, I started reaching out to folks in the NYC bitcoin community. I found a bitcoin investor online who was wiling to sell me a subway card in exchange for bitcoin. I met him at Penn Station the following day and he gladly helped me out. This interaction proved to me that the bitcoin network is very supportive of one another.

In my opinion, yes it is still really hard to use bitcoin as a regular currency. In our market where we buy food, clothes, shoes, there is no much more improvement in technology. Cash is the only thing they accept as exchange to what we buy to them (service or good). So paying them using a digital currency is not possible. I am not also sure if they knew about this currency, may be they still don’t. Not only in the market but also in school in this place, as payment for the tuition and miscellaneous fee cash is the only acceptable thing.

[orions.belt19]

This is unfortunately true, even now, the adoption of bitcoins didn't reach the critical point enabling a person to actually live just with it, you would still need to exchange it to your currency to get the most use of it. There are things being sold for BTC and you can buy them but there are things which aren't and are needed to live.
Even food, if you don't buy a gift card with bitcoins, you would need to search for hours for a physical shop/resturants which is hard.

This is true, the adoption of Bitcoins should advance more so that more Bitcoin users can use it with ease and convenience. In my country, the Philippines, our local wallet allows us to transact and pay bills directly. The high fees is a hindrance for users and Bitcoin should be more accepted in the market to allow more establishments and users to have it as a payment system.

[shimbark123]

Yes. Because we need to adjust with the new system. That's what I know. But if bitcoin became a regular currency that can be use by any people. Probably the adjusting period is the number one enemy of us. And for us who already use bitcoin. We would probably be happy.

[batang_bitcoin]

Yeah I think it is really hard to be used as a regular currency,
The fee for every transaction is high right now even if you are just going to send a small amount of money.

Within these days using bitcoin as regular currency applies only for those community that are into bitcoin and crypto currencies as well. But shopping alone in the mall, you will be disappointed. The society is still into the process of acceptance and knowing more about bitcoin so I don't question and worry about the hardship to use bitcoin as regular currency.