Malthus Catastrophe - Thanos's Ideal - Bitcoin Supply and Increasing Demand

[Mr. Answer]

1. Thomas Malthus Catastrophe

British mathematician and economist Thomas Robert Malthus lived in 1766-1834. He worked as a priest for a while. Malthus is famous for his Population Theory.

In his book "An Essay on the Principle of Population", he talked about the relation between human population and resources. According to Malthus, the human population increases geometrically over time. But amount of food sources increases arithmetically. So the population increases exponentially in the form of 2-4-8-16-32-64. Food sources increase as 1-2-3-4-5-6-7. Because food source production is very difficult and limited. After a certain period of time, the human population rises above the amount of resources. Food sources become insufficient for humans. This is Malthus Catastrophe.

Famine seems to be the last, the most dreadful resource of nature. The power of population is so superior to the power of the earth to produce subsistence for man, that premature death must in some shape or other visit the human race. The vices of mankind are active and able ministers of depopulation. They are the precursors in the great army of destruction, and often finish the dreadful work themselves. But should they fail in this war of extermination, sickly seasons, epidemics, pestilence, and plague advance in terrific array, and sweep off their thousands and tens of thousands. Should success be still incomplete, gigantic inevitable famine stalks in the rear, and with one mighty blow levels the population with the food of the world.
— Thomas Malthus, 1798. An Essay on the Principle of Population. Chapter VII, p. 61

This theory is described with a diagram like this:


According to Malthus, there are some ways to prevent this disaster. Birth control, married couples living far from each other, delay the marriage age, cessation of helping poor people, he offered such radical solutions. Malthus thought poor people were breeding more. These ideas of Malthus received harsh criticism. Another force that can prevent this catastrophe is nature. Natural disasters, epidemics, source wars etc. With all this, nature seeks its own balance. We can count as an example: Corona epidemic today, big source wars in the Middle East, earthquakes, hurricanes. Ever-growing population of people is using resources excessively, millions are killed in wars.

Darwin was influenced by the views of Malthus. Malthus's views form the basis of Social Darwinism. Also, according to Malthus, the reason for impoverishment is population growth.

There are some criticisms of the theory. "It was made according to the conditions of the time, it is now rotten. Because technology has improved. We can produce more food." I think this is a narrow view. Doesn't technology have a saturation point? Of course there is! With technology, only doping was done. How much of the food produced today is natural and how much is healthy? Most people started to get cancer. Catastrophe may have been delayed for a while, but there is no escape. With the development of technology, the human population has increased excessively. What happens when technology reaches its saturation point? Human population will necessarily remain stable or decrease. We can see how similar this chart is to the bitcoin chart. : )

2. Thanos's Ideal

Let's explain the issue with a little more popular culture. There is a villain named Thanos in the Marvel fantasy universe. In fact, he is a hero for some Malthusians. He knows that the resources in the universe are scarce and the population growth is infinite. His own world has been exposed to the Malthus Catastrophe. All his compatriots are dead. Therefore, his only ideal is to ensure the welfare of the universe. For this he wanted to randomly destroy half of all living things. As he describes this heavy thought, he says the following sentences:

A small price to pay for salvation. Little one, it’s a simple calculus. This universe is finite, its resources, finite… if life is left unchecked, life will cease to exist. It needs correction. I’m the only one who knows that.
...
I finally rest. And watch the sun rise on a grateful universe. The hardest choices require the strongest wills.

From this point of view, Thanos is a Malthusian. Some critics say that Thanos misused his power. "If Thanos would have created twice resources, problem would be solved." Then what excitement would be left in the movie? He emphasized the inevitability of the Malthus Disaster by saying "I'm Catastrophe" on the famous stage.

3. Limited Bitcoin Supply and Increasing Demand

Father of Modern Economy Alfred Marshall defines demand and supply in this way:

“Demand is defined as the desire for a commodity, backed by the ability to buy, and willingness to pay for it, at a given price, during a particular period of time.” (Dr. Alfred Marshall)

“The supply of a commodity may be defined as the amount of the commodity which the sellers able a willing to offer for sale at particular price during certain period of time.” (Dr. Alfred Marshall)

Bitcoin is limited to 21 million. About 40% have not been moving for many years. Total supply will decrease as people die. 21 million (*10^8) This number looks huge. Actually it is still scarce. Just like the resources in the world. The limited supply of bitcoin makes it valuable in the short / medium term. Can the Malthus Catastrophe be seen in bitcoin in the long term?

The trade volume increases geometrically. But the number of bitcoins remains constant (or decreases over time). In this case, bitcoin ceases to be an active means of payment for commerce. Because, a currency whose value is constantly increasing and decreasing in number is not used in trade. Gold is therefore not used in real trade. Purpose of Bitcoin creation was to make trade (P2P) decentralized. What is the purpose of Bitcoin purpose? If not trade, what is it? Maybe it is used only as a value storage tool like gold. Can this shared goal with gold save the bitcoin?

With the hope of living in a world where resources are shared fairly.

Utilized resources: [Wikipedia] [CBR] [Twitsozler] [Theconversation] [Kriptocoin] [Cryptonewsz] [Malthusian] [Malthusianism] [marvelcinematicuniverse [medium]]

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[nelson4lov]

Firstly, it's an undeniable fact that the population rate in the world is growing at unprecedented levels. I'm also of the opinion that the universe always looks for a way to keep everything balanced because if population is left unchecked, it can cause some serious issues in the long run.

What is the purpose of Bitcoin purpose? If not trade, what is it? Maybe it is used only as a value storage tool like gold. Can this shared goal with gold save the bitcoin?

Bitcoin was originally created to ushered in a  decentralized era. In a world heavily dominated by governments and top organizations, there was a growing need to put some power back in the hands of the people. While this was Bitcoin's original purpose, Bitcoin has since moved to become a lot of things including acting as a store of value, serving as a standard for peer-to-peer payments and transactions, it even acts as a solid source of income for a lot of people. That said, I believe that as more BTC get into circulation, more and more people will get to own bitcoin. We might still have a monopoly but it would be at the bare minimum.  This hasn't been empirically investigated though – we'll have to see how things play out.

[odolvlobo]

There are some criticisms of the theory. "It was made according to the conditions of the time, it is now rotten. Because technology has improved. We can produce more food." I think this is a narrow view.

I agree, but I think it is partially correct. I think one flaw in the theory is that the production increase is assumed to be linear, even though the labor pool is assumed to increase exponentially.

Bitcoin is limited to 21 million. About 40% have not been moving for many years. Total supply will decrease as people die. 21 million (*10^8) This number looks huge. Actually it is still scarce. Just like the resources in the world. The limited supply of bitcoin makes it valuable in the short / medium term. Can the Malthus Catastrophe be seen in bitcoin in the long term?

I don't think it applies. Other than being lost, bitcoins are not consumed, so there is no danger of running out. The problem is that a satoshi might eventually become too valuable to be useful.

The trade volume increases geometrically. But the number of bitcoins remains constant (or decreases over time). In this case, bitcoin ceases to be an active means of payment for commerce. Because, a currency whose value is constantly increasing and decreasing in number is not used in trade.

It's not that simple. The values of all currencies go up and down, yet they continue to be used.The issue for Bitcoin is the high volatility in its price, but I assume that the volatility will drop to acceptable levels as adoption increases.

[hatshepsut93]

I agree, but I think it is partially correct. I think one flaw in the theory is that the production increase is assumed to be linear, even though the labor pool is assumed to increase exponentially.

Another flaw is that population is assumed to be growing exponentially, while we already see that it is slowing down globally, and many countries even have declining population.

Anyway, the deflationary nature of Bitcoin was discussed many times, but my take is that it's irrelevant until Bitcoin becomes very widely adopted, which will likely never happen, so it will never have any macroeconomic effects. Also, this whole store of value vs currency argument is flawed, because people will use it however they likely. Bitcoin wasn't created to be one of them, regardless of what Satoshi said or wanted, Bitcoin is freedom, and freedom means Bitcoin is a currency, a store of value, and just whatever you want it to be.

[NotATether]

I'm inclined to think that if at any point supply becomes less than the available demand, then this will cause people to buy more bitcoins out of scarcity, thus pushing up the bitcoin price. This in turn will cause people to trade with smaller amounts of bitcoin.  This graph assumes that adoption of bitcoin will explode after a break-even point, but I don't think that is likely to happen for the time being.

Sure a world event could cause normal people to suddenly get more interested in bitcoin, but it would have to be a sufficiently important world event or a combination of world events, because now we have a pandemic but bitcoin adoption still hasn't increased drastically.

Even if 100% of the bitcoins were active, the supply is still limited to 21 million and if trading activities use sufficiently small values of bitcoins, 21 million bitcoins quickly becomes not enough money. But traders have enough common sense to know that when bitcoins become more scarce, they trade their things with smaller amounts of bitcoin. It's how currencies worked before stock exchanges existed.

[ranochigo]

The theory is valid for the things that has a finite supply and the supply cannot be increased immediately. While the market capital is capped at 21 million Bitcoins, the denomination of Bitcoin is fairly big and there is no intermediate danger of it running out or else there would be a lot more billionaires in the world. Even if it does, somehow run out one day, a simple code change would allow the network to be forked and have an even smaller denomination.

[Dildo Shwaggins]

Firstly, it's an undeniable fact that the population rate in the world is growing at unprecedented levels. I'm also of the opinion that the universe always looks for a way to keep everything balanced because if population is left unchecked, it can cause some serious issues in the long run.

The universe does not revolve around humanity. Humans are an insignificant part of time and space. Balance has to do with physics in cosmos, patterns and symmetries, and not with the population of our species on planet Earth. We are so vulnerable that we can be extinct in a few decades after a major catastrophe occurs.

Also Thomas Malthus was probably concerned about the certain era and not the distant future (our present). He was proven wrong, and his intentions are often criticized.

[kryptqnick]

There are some criticisms of the theory. "It was made according to the conditions of the time, it is now rotten. Because technology has improved. We can produce more food." I think this is a narrow view. Doesn't technology have a saturation point? Of course there is! With technology, only doping was done. How much of the food produced today is natural and how much is healthy? Most people started to get cancer. Catastrophe may have been delayed for a while, but there is no escape. With the development of technology, the human population has increased excessively. What happens when technology reaches its saturation point? Human population will necessarily remain stable or decrease. We can see how similar this chart is to the bitcoin chart. : )

3. Limited Bitcoin Supply and Increasing Demand

Father of Modern Economy Alfred Marshall defines demand and supply in this way:

“Demand is defined as the desire for a commodity, backed by the ability to buy, and willingness to pay for it, at a given price, during a particular period of time.” (Dr. Alfred Marshall)

“The supply of a commodity may be defined as the amount of the commodity which the sellers able a willing to offer for sale at particular price during certain period of time.” (Dr. Alfred Marshall)

Bitcoin is limited to 21 million. About 40% have not been moving for many years. Total supply will decrease as people die. 21 million (*10^8) This number looks huge. Actually it is still scarce. Just like the resources in the world. The limited supply of bitcoin makes it valuable in the short / medium term. Can the Malthus Catastrophe be seen in bitcoin in the long term?

I have a couple of objections here.
1. Currently, the problem of famine is NOT a problem of scarcity of food but of its redistribution. A lot of food in wealthy countries gets spoiled and thrown away because nobody ever buys it/eats it, while many people remain hungry. So that whole Malthus thing seems to be wrong.
2. I don't think comparing a food scarcity with Bitcoin scarcity makes much sense because while from one bread only Jesus can make enough food for many people, breaking BTC into Satoshis is perfectly fine if the price grows, and suddenly we don't have such a scarcity anymore.

[Lizzylove1]

Malhus theorem has been defeated by hard working nations with a sincere production plan because of the advent of high powerful technological instrument. Bitcoin total supply will certainly continue to decrease as holders die without traceable files on how to recover them, together with lost or pK .

[stompix]

Malthus simply happened to live at the wrong time and draw the wrong conclusions.

At his time the population in the UK was growing by more than 10% every decade (currently under 5% and only by immigration) and there was no real advancement in food production, things that changed dramatically in the next century. So, had he been born in 1866, not 1766 things would have been different.

I agree, but I think it is partially correct. I think one flaw in the theory is that the production increase is assumed to be linear, even though the labor pool is assumed to increase exponentially.

Another flaw is that population is assumed to be growing exponentially, while we already see that it is slowing down globally, and many countries even have declining population.

This! People look at the poor countries growing in population and think this will be like that forever, no it won't.
Fertility rates are decreasing all over the world with the exception of Sub-Saharian states:
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.TFRT.IN?locations=IN-PK-BD-VN-TH-ID

The population is still growing right now at this speed in Asia because the people who are making kids now are the ones from the boom in the '80-'00 but the number of kids they make is two to three times less than their parents.  The western world has already gone through this, South America and Asia are next, then the Middle East and Africa and at that point, we might even see a decline.

Education is doing its things, there won't be any catastrophe.
Everyone should watc this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsBT5EQt348

 

[Wenbing]

Thomas Malthus population theory is accurate without technology but not accurate with technology.

So, with crypto technology the resources will be more than  the population especially when the resources is handled in a transparent blockchain technology.

[d5000]

This! People look at the poor countries growing in population and think this will be like that forever, no it won't.
Fertility rates are decreasing all over the world with the exception of Sub-Saharian states:
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.TFRT.IN?locations=IN-PK-BD-VN-TH-ID

Even in Sub-Saharian Africa the rates are lowering constantly. One fact which seems to be contributing to that is urbanization. Some African cities like Addis Ababa already have fertility rates at around of 2 children per woman (Addis in fact has 1.9). This process is currently advancing very fast and has dramatically changed the lifestyle of people there.

Also growth rates in Sub-Saharan Africa are now lowering, in fact, their peak was in the mid-1980s, with a second (lower) peak in the early 2010s after the HIV catastrophe. In the coming years population growth will be linear even in this region.

So what does this mean for Bitcoin? Population growth can be still a fact contributing to demand until some year between 2050 and 2100 (the world's population peak is expected currently in these years), so most of us in our lifetimes, could see a population-driven Bitcoin demand until we die. But in the long term this could change, as in the whole world population could begin to decline.

However, economic growth is much more important for Bitcoin demand. And what Malthus didn't take into account is the almost infinite potential of resources in the service sector. Services' quality can be still greatly increased by technological advancements, so it can decouple from the availability of resources like energy, land or labor. At least in the following 1000 years that growth could last - if we don't end this tendency due to our own stupidity.

[davis196]

I get the Malthus theory and the market laws of supply and demand,but what's your point with this thread OP?It seems to me that there's just a bunch of copy pasted information and no thesis.
The human civilization will be in big trouble within the next few decades,when the population growth of the third world gets out of control,however,I don't get why Bitcoin has something to do with this problem?
The Malthus theory(and the Thanos theory) are about natural resources.Bitcoin is not a natural resource,BTC is a currency/financial asset.

[charlesmichel1]

Unlike most of limited resources like water and gold Bitcoin is very dividable. It is resistant to Malthus Catastrophe even in the long term.

[hatshepsut93]

Thomas Malthus population theory is accurate without technology but not accurate with technology.

So, with crypto technology the resources will be more than  the population especially when the resources is handled in a transparent blockchain technology.

Yes and no. Technology did change the curve significantly since it allowed food to supply to outmatch the exponential growth of the population, but still technology can't give us infinite resources, so unless humans leave Earth and start colonizing the whole universe, infinite growth is impossible.

But as for blockchain, it has nothing to do with resources, it can't create goods, it can't even improve existing systems, as of now there's no truly big practical applications of it that would matter, despite so many years being spent on working on it.

[Mr. Answer]

Thanks for the great comments. Bitcoin is a limited currency. I'm not sure if this is an advantage.