Bitcoin's Usefulness - So utterly apparent

[notme]

What about the sudden implementation of withdrawal limits on savings accounts? Apparently, more than 6 withdrawals from savings per month is some kind of federal reporting trigger, and the bank can and will close your account for exceeding that. I don't recall any such limitation until recently, although I am not sure what law was passed to make that effective. They insist that you use a checking account for frequent transfers instead.

I wonder if there is some backdoor law that allows them to snoop on checking accounts but not savings accounts, and so they decided to make savings accounts less useful. It's strange.

You wanted change, you got it!

Oh shut up, Reg D has been around long before Obama

http://www.bankersonline.com/compliance/guru2010/gurus_comp051710a.html

[rjk]

What about the sudden implementation of withdrawal limits on savings accounts? Apparently, more than 6 withdrawals from savings per month is some kind of federal reporting trigger, and the bank can and will close your account for exceeding that. I don't recall any such limitation until recently, although I am not sure what law was passed to make that effective. They insist that you use a checking account for frequent transfers instead.

I wonder if there is some backdoor law that allows them to snoop on checking accounts but not savings accounts, and so they decided to make savings accounts less useful. It's strange.

You wanted change, you got it!

Oh shut up, Reg D has been around long before Obama

http://www.bankersonline.com/compliance/guru2010/gurus_comp051710a.html

Strange that it is being enforced only recently? I haven't had issues years ago.

[giszmo]

The issue with getting cash isn't a sign banks are going south (cash is a tiny fraction of a banks "assets" and "liabilities").  The amount of cash a bank can get you has no bearing on its solvency.  What the issue does illustrate is the govt (not just US but all govt) attempt to marginalize cash.

This process has been going on for 40+ years.  Ever wonder why there is no bill larger than a $100?    You could get a $100 bill in 1970 yet the largest bill you can get today is still $100 and it only has the purchashing power of <$20 (1970 dollars).  They didn't get rid of the $100 bill in 1970 why isn't there a $500 bill today.

In 1878 you could get cash in a 10,000 bill (there was at one time a 100K bill but it was a rare gold cert oddity so we will ignore it).  Today $10K cash note may seem crazy but remember this was 1878.  $10K in 1878 would be the equivalent of $317,682 today.  

Now the $10K note was pretty rare but lets look at a smaller not which remained in active circulation until 1968; the $500 bill.  Since the $500 bill was discontinued the US govt hasn't discontinued any other bills and the $100 remains the largest bill.   However due to inflation the purchashing power of the largest bill has gone down.   $100 today is the equivalent of $15.14 in 1968.

So in 1968 when they discontinued the $500, they chose to make the largest bill $100, not $50, or $20, or $10.  Limiting largest bill to $10 may seem insane but due to inflation (and not introducing larger bills) that is exactly what the govt has done.   The largest bill today has less purchashing power than a $20 bill when the govt decided to remove the $500 but keep the $100/$50/$20.  The govt doesn't need to remove the $100 bill (and thus cash in general) inflation will eventually make it nearly worthless.  

 It gets worse when you consider most ATM only dispense $20 and many places only accept $20 bills.  $20 today is the equivelent of $3.07 in 1968.  The fact that most places don't give/take bills larger than $20 is as outrageous as a store in 1968 saying "sorry we don't take large bills like $5 got any ones, or maybe a handful of coins".

Had the govt simply stepped in and eliminated a cash there would have been a backlash.  By letting inflation, bank cash limits, ATM denominations, and store policies do the work cash can be eliminated as a functional mechanism of exchange over time.

Funny So while some want to abandon the penny, they don't bother to abandon it cause they plan to abandon cash completely? Sounds logical to me.

[2112]

What about the sudden implementation of withdrawal limits on savings accounts? Apparently, more than 6 withdrawals from savings per month is some kind of federal reporting trigger, and the bank can and will close your account for exceeding that. I don't recall any such limitation until recently, although I am not sure what law was passed to make that effective. They insist that you use a checking account for frequent transfers instead.

This limitation was there since forever. The root of it is in the costs of insuring and maintaining the account. I'm kinda thinking that "sudden" probably means "first time in my life that I read the account disclosure booklet. I used to simply throw it away."

One thing that US banking system has figured out exceedingly well is the default and fraud risk on personal accounts. There are so many flags that signal imminent personal bankruptcy, one of them is lack of normal monthly or biweekly budget planning. It manifests itself by too frequent too small withdrawals. The limits are on the quantity of individual withdrawals, not on the total amount withdrawn.

Railing against those limits is akin to railing against higher car insurance rates for unmarried men less than 25 years old. It leads nowhere because it has no wider social support.

[rjk]

What about the sudden implementation of withdrawal limits on savings accounts? Apparently, more than 6 withdrawals from savings per month is some kind of federal reporting trigger, and the bank can and will close your account for exceeding that. I don't recall any such limitation until recently, although I am not sure what law was passed to make that effective. They insist that you use a checking account for frequent transfers instead.

This limitation was there since forever. The root of it is in the costs of insuring and maintaining the account. I'm kinda thinking that "sudden" probably means "first time in my life that I read the account disclosure booklet. I used to simply throw it away."

One thing that US banking system has figured out exceedingly well is the default and fraud risk on personal accounts. There are so many flags that signal imminent personal bankruptcy, one of them is lack of normal monthly or biweekly budget planning. It manifests itself by too frequent too small withdrawals. The limits are on the quantity of individual withdrawals, not on the total amount withdrawn.

Railing against those limits is akin to railing against higher car insurance rates for unmarried men less than 25 years old. It leads nowhere because it has no wider social support.

Well in that case, I've decided to set off all the alarms by never using a savings account again. Mainly because my checking account pays more interest than the savings.

[notme]

What about the sudden implementation of withdrawal limits on savings accounts? Apparently, more than 6 withdrawals from savings per month is some kind of federal reporting trigger, and the bank can and will close your account for exceeding that. I don't recall any such limitation until recently, although I am not sure what law was passed to make that effective. They insist that you use a checking account for frequent transfers instead.

This limitation was there since forever. The root of it is in the costs of insuring and maintaining the account. I'm kinda thinking that "sudden" probably means "first time in my life that I read the account disclosure booklet. I used to simply throw it away."

One thing that US banking system has figured out exceedingly well is the default and fraud risk on personal accounts. There are so many flags that signal imminent personal bankruptcy, one of them is lack of normal monthly or biweekly budget planning. It manifests itself by too frequent too small withdrawals. The limits are on the quantity of individual withdrawals, not on the total amount withdrawn.

Railing against those limits is akin to railing against higher car insurance rates for unmarried men less than 25 years old. It leads nowhere because it has no wider social support.

Well in that case, I've decided to set off all the alarms by never using a savings account again. Mainly because my checking account pays more interest than the savings.

Indeed.  I have a savings account with $5 in it because it is required to be a member of my credit union.  Everything else (USD-wise) goes in checking.  Actually, I have a small savings account that I share with my fiance that gets $10/week for each of us, but we may convert it to a checking at some point.  We have never had to make more than 2 withdrawals a month, and even checking account interest is crap so it's just not worth the hassle.

[2112]

Well in that case, I've decided to set off all the alarms by never using a savings account again. Mainly because my checking account pays more interest than the savings.

What can I say to that? I envision for you the future of using check cashing, payday loan, rent-to-own & pawn shop establishments.

It can happen to anyone; I'm not sure if this is the correct link for Collateral Lender of Beverly Hills. It is a lifestyle choice and also probably lasts a lifetime.

http://www.collaterallender.com/

Or maybe your future wife will be your credit manager? I've seen that too.

[notme]

Well in that case, I've decided to set off all the alarms by never using a savings account again. Mainly because my checking account pays more interest than the savings.

What can I say to that? I envision for you the future of using check cashing, payday loan, rent-to-own & pawn shop establishments.

It can happen to anyone; I'm not sure if this is the correct link for Collateral Lender of Beverly Hills. It is a lifestyle choice and also probably lasts a lifetime.

http://www.collaterallender.com/

Or maybe your future wife will be your credit manager? I've seen that too.

How will saving his money in a checking account that yields higher interest than a savings with less restrictions hurt his finances?

[2112]

How will saving his money in a checking account that yields higher interest than a savings with less restrictions hurt his finances?

I'm not interested in providing credit counseling to the "how-much-per-month" crowd. There are at least two industries providing that advice in the USA: one for-profit and one non-profit. They have quite respectable success ratios. But as they say in a joke:

Q: How many psychotherapists does it take to change a lightbulb?
A: Normally just one, but the lightbulb has to want to change.

[notme]

How will saving his money in a checking account that yields higher interest than a savings with less restrictions hurt his finances?

I'm not interested in providing credit counseling to the "how-much-per-month" crowd. There are at least two industries providing that advice in the USA: one for-profit and one non-profit. They have quite respectable success ratios. But as they say in a joke:

Q: How many psychotherapists does it take to change a lightbulb?
A: Normally just one, but the lightbulb has to want to change.

I don't follow at all.  What does this have to do with credit/financing?  We are talking about deposit accounts.

[rjk]

I'm not sure I understand either, but from what I gather, 2112 is saying that I am a credit risk because I perform many transactions per month, or something.

I'm not sure how it is relevant, especially given my stellar credit, but

[notme]

I'm not sure I understand either, but from what I gather, 2112 is saying that I am a credit risk because I perform many transactions per month, or something.

I'm not sure how it is relevant, especially given my stellar credit, but

I think he just has a chip on his shoulder about something and is trying to transfer it to you.

[casascius]

How will saving his money in a checking account that yields higher interest than a savings with less restrictions hurt his finances?

I'm not interested in providing credit counseling to the "how-much-per-month" crowd. There are at least two industries providing that advice in the USA: one for-profit and one non-profit. They have quite respectable success ratios. But as they say in a joke:

I don't get it either.  I don't regularly use a savings account, and I haven't pawned anything in my life.  If I walk into a car dealership, I consider it a given that I can drive away in anything I want, brand new and fully loaded, with nothing more than a signature.  So what is the secret I am missing?

[Phinnaeus Gage]

What's going on is both of you are stupid for banking at small banks when they are the prey of bigger banks. and I'm not saying this to be rude, I'm actually answering your question believe it or not.

Interesting story none the less.. almost sounded unreal or like it was staged in Hollywood in some parts. (for example the perfect timing with the other client, and miscounting to give "Ed" $2000).. lol.. and did she really ask to suck your dicks? It was believable at that point in the story.

in re. miscounting: When the teller was counting the bills, she must have gotten it mixed up in her mind between $1,900 and $2,000. Ed and I were only expecting $1,900. The final count came to $1,920 somehow (perhaps new bills stuck together, for a majority of them were crisp). She recounted and it came to $1,920 once again. But instead of returning a $20 bill to the till, she reached into the till and pulled out 4 $20 bills. She adds them to the pile and presents them all with a final count of $2,000 to Ed.

I pretty sure that they could have gave him/us a few hundred dollar bills, but I firmly believe that a vindictive attitude sat in, as in, "Take that you bastards, and you're not getting your dicks sucked either!"

Speaking of dick sucking, she really didn't think, let alone say, that. If you read my (true) story carefully, you'll see that I infected that aspect twice for humor purposes only. Sorry for any confusion.

I just reread my account to hunt down what you mean by "the perfect timing with the other client", but it seems to elude me. I did realize something though. Why did she ask if big bills would be fine, but proceeded to only give twenties? Taxing my memory, I seemed to hash that same thought in my mind while driving to Wisconsin. That, and Matthew eating pet dogs (with names).  

~Bruno~

[casascius]

Taxing my memory, I seemed to hash that same thought in my mind while driving to Wisconsin.

I too have found it very taxing on my memory to perform hash operations in my mind.  I am only able to perform about 0.000000003 MH/s mentally, and will probably need to drive to the moon to have enough time to solve a block that way.

[notme]

Taxing my memory, I seemed to hash that same thought in my mind while driving to Wisconsin.

I too have found it very taxing on my memory to perform hash operations in my mind.  I am only able to perform about 0.000000003 MH/s mentally, and will probably need to drive to the moon to have enough time to solve a block that way.

Can you really compute 6 sha256 sums in 1000 seconds without a computer?  That's impressive.

[2112]

I'm not sure I understand either, but from what I gather, 2112 is saying that I am a credit risk because I perform many transactions per month, or something.

I'm not sure how it is relevant, especially given my stellar credit, but

Ah, a land-less and family-less youngster whith a post-secondary education (or while obtaining a post-secondary degree) with "stellar" debt-slave score. I just hope that you aren't black, because my pot-shot was all equal-opportunity, non-discriminatory and race-blind.

I'll tell you the story. Years ago I went to the bookstore to pick up a special order. Due to mistakes the book I was handed was something like "Proceedings of a TRW conference on numerical modeling in consumer finance {or some such}". It was raining so I spent couple of hours flipping through it, but I now still regret not buying it.

There was a ton of super-interesting nuggets in it, but I particularly remember the "behavioral modeling" chapter. There was a matrix of data from MBNA who used to run credit cards affiliated with professional associations. In most of the upper bands of income the most profitable (for MBNA) card was ADA (American Dental Association) and the worst performing was AICPA (American Institute of Certified Public Accountants). Not surprisingly dentists had higher credit scores than accountans, normalized for all other factors.

The moral of this story? The "credit score" isn't meant to measure the likelihood of you repaying the debt. It is meant to measure how profitable of a customer you are going to become for the credit grantor. There exist people who wouldn't consider "high credit score" to be something to be proud of.

[2112]

I don't get it either.  I don't regularly use a savings account, and I haven't pawned anything in my life.  If I walk into a car dealership, I consider it a given that I can drive away in anything I want, brand new and fully loaded, with nothing more than a signature.  So what is the secret I am missing?

I presume that with your car dealership story you've meant to convey that you are an experienced point-of-sale credit user, that you've obtained car loans from the car salespeople, morgage from the builder's salespeople, player credit at the casino cage, etc.

In that case the secret you are missing could probably be expressed in the old Jewish proverb: "Don't ask the tailor if the suit fits."

I apologise if I misunderstood you and the "nothing more than a signature" was in fact a signature on your check that your presented to the fleet sales rep at the car dealer's.

[rjk]

I'm not sure I understand either, but from what I gather, 2112 is saying that I am a credit risk because I perform many transactions per month, or something.

I'm not sure how it is relevant, especially given my stellar credit, but

Ah, a land-less and family-less youngster whith a post-secondary education (or while obtaining a post-secondary degree) with "stellar" debt-slave score. I just hope that you aren't black, because my pot-shot was all equal-opportunity, non-discriminatory and race-blind.

I'll tell you the story. Years ago I went to the bookstore to pick up a special order. Due to mistakes the book I was handed was something like "Proceedings of a TRW conference on numerical modeling in consumer finance {or some such}". It was raining so I spent couple of hours flipping through it, but I now still regret not buying it.

There was a ton of super-interesting nuggets in it, but I particularly remember the "behavioral modeling" chapter. There was a matrix of data from MBNA who used to run credit cards affiliated with professional associations. In most of the upper bands of income the most profitable (for MBNA) card was ADA (American Dental Association) and the worst performing was AICPA (American Institute of Certified Public Accountants). Not surprisingly dentists had higher credit scores than accountans, normalized for all other factors.

The moral of this story? The "credit score" isn't meant to measure the likelihood of you repaying the debt. It is meant to measure how profitable of a customer you are going to become for the credit grantor. There exist people who wouldn't consider "high credit score" to be something to be proud of.

Interesting. I wasn't necessarily referring to a score as such, I simply stated credit in general. Although I have made use of the 3 free reports per year to ascertain my creditworthiness, since they are free after all.
I'll also give you some interesting tidbits so that you may continue to draw conclusions. For instance, I make heavy use of electronic transactions (ACH, credit/debit cards, etc.) because they are convenient and because I am not charged anything to do so. Indeed, I am paid to do so in some cases, particularly in the example of credit cards with "reward points" and such.

You could say that that is my effort to leach off of a failed system, but we all know that the ones footing the bill are the merchants and the ones that pay the sky-high percentages and fees when they dare to use their credit beyond where they are able to repay. That is one of the reasons I discovered and embraced Bitcoin - it allows me the convenience of online payments without enriching an existing infrastructure.

And guesses as to my age by others here have been all over the map, ranging from really low to really high, so perhaps I am obtuse enough to be confusing.

[casascius]

I don't get it either.  I don't regularly use a savings account, and I haven't pawned anything in my life.  If I walk into a car dealership, I consider it a given that I can drive away in anything I want, brand new and fully loaded, with nothing more than a signature.  So what is the secret I am missing?

I presume that with your car dealership story you've meant to convey that you are an experienced point-of-sale credit user, that you've obtained car loans from the car salespeople, morgage from the builder's salespeople, player credit at the casino cage, etc.

In that case the secret you are missing could probably be expressed in the old Jewish proverb: "Don't ask the tailor if the suit fits."

I apologise if I misunderstood you and the "nothing more than a signature" was in fact a signature on your check that your presented to the fleet sales rep at the car dealer's.

Pure genius. How else could someone know I live paycheck to paycheck, use pawn shops and payday lenders, built my own home to suit, and at the same time can write a check to buy a new car. THAT MAKES PERFECT SENSE!