The Bitcoin Standard
SAIFEDEAN AMMOUS, PHD, is a bitcoin-focused independent economist, author, and educator. On his website saifedean.com, he teaches bitcoin and economics classes in the Austrian school tradition.
In 2008, a pseudonymous programmer offered "a new electronic payment system that's totally peer-to-peer, with no trusted third party" to a small internet mailing group. Despite all odds, this upstart autonomous decentralized software presents an unstoppable and globally accessible hard money alternative to current central banks ten years later. The Bitcoin Standard examines the historical context of Bitcoin's growth, the economic qualities that have allowed it to grow rapidly, and the anticipated economic, political, and social repercussions.
While Bitcoin is a digital-age innovation, the problem it seeks to solve is as old as human society itself: transferring value across time and space. Author Saifedean Ammous takes the reader on a fascinating tour through the history of money-making technology, from early trading networks using limestones and seashells to metals, coins, the gold standard, and present government debt. Exploring what gave these technologies their monetary role, and how most of them lost it, gives the reader a good idea of what makes for sound money, and sets the stage for an economic discussion of its implications for individual and societal future-orientation, capital accumulation, trade, peace, culture, and art. Ammous convincingly demonstrates that the loftiest achievements of humanity have occurred in cultures that have benefited from sound monetary systems, and that monetary collapse has frequently accompanied civilizational collapse.
With this foundation established, the book proceeds to explain the working of Bitcoin in a functional and intuitive manner. Bitcoin is a decentralized, distributed piece of software that converts electricity and processing power into undeniably correct records, letting its users to use the Internet to fulfill traditional monetary activities without having to rely on or trust any physical authorities or infrastructure. As a result, Bitcoin is best understood as the first effectively deployed type of digital cash and hard money. With an automated and perfectly predictable monetary policy, as well as the ability to perform final settlement of large sums across the globe in a matter of minutes, Bitcoin's true competitive advantage may simply be as a store of value and network for the final settlement of large paymentsa digital form of gold with a built-in settlement infrastructure.
Ammous' excellent understanding of both technological potential and historical realities of monetary evolution makes for an intriguing investigation of the repercussions of voluntary free market money. Bitcoin, by challenging the most sacrosanct of government monopolies, pushes the pendulum of sovereignty away from governments and toward individuals, allowing us the enticing potential of a world where money is completely free of politics and borders.
The book's last chapter delves into some of the most frequently asked topics about Bitcoin: Is Bitcoin mining an inefficient use of resources? Is Bitcoin used by criminals? Who owns Bitcoin, and can they modify it whenever they want? How can Bitcoin be eradicated? And what to make of the dozens of Bitcoin forks and ostensibly useful implementations of Bitcoin's "block chain technology"? The Bitcoin Standard is a must-read for anybody interested in the growth of the Internet's decentralized, apolitical, free-market alternative to state central banks.
Author: Saifedean Ammous
Link to buy: https://www.amazon.com/Bitcoin-Standard-Decentralized-Alternative-Central/dp/1119473861
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