Hacker News Books

You could replace Bitcoin with USD and say the same thing. Any currency has value because those in power insist on taxes being paid in that currency, otherwise it is just what people believe it to be. Read "When Money Dies", excellent book about how a government can ruin the trust that is the basis of fiat.

I recommend the book by Andrew Fergusson called "When Money Dies" which is about the period of hyperinflation in Weimar Germany. Note that I do not claim to know 100% that this will happen in the USA .

It was written in the late 1970s I believe so is not geared to anything "trendy" for today and I think this makes the book better.

Read When Money Dies by Adam Fergusson. This is the worst thing that can happen.

Having lived through hyperinflation, I do believe that printing trillions (+40% last 12 months, +75% since '09 crisis) has negative consequences.

There is no free lunch.

On avoiding hyperinflation, it's certainly true that we know how to do it. For the infamous Weimar hyperinflation, I'd refer you to Adam Fergusson's When Money Dies; what drove the hyperinflation was two things, that the government was unwilling to control its spending (it risked France annexing the Saarland), and that the head of the national bank was poorly educated. When Schacht was brought in, in 1923 (10 years before Hitler; Schacht has a reputation as Hitler's banker, but had never heard of Hitler in '23), he was able to stabilize things pretty quickly: Britain had intervened to rule out a French annexation of the Saarland, and Schacht was more with-it on monetary theory than his predecessor had been.

The risk of Wiemar-like circumstances striking again in the West are basically zero, unless a Wiemar-like perfect storm of defeat and ignorance strikes again; and even then, hyperinflation never lasts long (no one can live under it for long). One woman weathered the Wiemar hyperinflation by selling one link of a gold Rosary chain a day to buy food; a quite modest amount of precious metal is enough to outlast this sort of disaster.

Might I suggest: "When Money Dies" ?
The classic history of what happens when a nation’s currency depreciates beyond recovery.
http://www.amazon.com/When-Money-Dies-Devaluation-Hyperinfla...

> “Speculation on the stock exchange has spread to all ranks of the population and shares rise like air balloons to limitless heights. … My banker congratulates me on every new rise, but he does not dispel the secret uneasiness which my growing wealth arouses in me … it already amounts to millions.”

-- "When Money Dies"

Highly recommend the book “When Money Dies” about hyperinflation in the Weimar Republic. It digs into how the inflation grew and its effects on real people. Those who illegally transferred their savings to foreign currency early did the best, but many long term savers had their entire life savings wiped out.

Early in the process people were exuberant since the markets were rising and their paper net worth was increasing, so they were selling valuable assets like pianos for money that would quickly become worthless. Eventually the farmers became extremely powerful since they had the one thing everyone needed.

Also worth mentioning that Bitcoin’s volatility makes it a poor inflation hedge, but this is for different reasons than the author of the article suggests. It’s more because the Bitcoin ecosystem is highly manipulated and it’s still unclear what a fair price for Bitcoin looks like.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1586489941/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_awdb_imm...

I'd guess that unrest is inevitable when a country gets a debt problem whichever way you deal with it. The current unrest in London and other UK cities may be the result of austerity and what happened in Greece recently certainly is.

However, the alternative (inflation) would have the same effect. See 1920's Germany/Austria for example - 'When Money Dies' by Adam Fergusson is the book on this.