From: Wei Dai <weidai@eskimo.com>
Date: Sat, 12 Dec 1998 09:37:58 +0800
To: cypherpunks@cyberpass.net
Subject: Re: alternative b-money creation
In-Reply-To: <19981211135656.A13424@eskimo.com>
Message-ID: <19981211162940.C22476@eskimo.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



On Fri, Dec 11, 1998 at 06:48:05PM -0400, Ian Grigg wrote:
> It is true that there is positive demand for a medium of
> exchange.
> 
> It is not true that fiat money is controlled by a
> sufficiently benevolent agency, and it is patently
> not true that there is a finite supply.

What I meant is that the current supply of money (i.e. the total amount of
money in circulation) is finite, not that it can't increase in the future.
And by sufficiently benevolent, I mean people do not expect the government
to print so much money that it becomes totally worthless, at least not in
the short term.

I'm not trying to defend fiat money. After all I proposed b-money as an
alternative exactly because fiat money does have serious problems. But
having no reason for people to accept it is not one of them.