Fiat Hot Potato Bitcoin Musical Chairs – Bitcoin Magazine
This is an opinion editorial by Maxx Mannheimer, a former sales account manager with a background in training and industrial-organizational psychology.
The economy can be considered a complex orchestra. Industry sectors are represented by choirs, strings, brass, woodwinds and percussion. These sectors all work together as harmoniously as possible to create a seamless experience for listeners and for themselves. Each individual uses the instruments available to them to add value to our collective experience.
In a classical orchestra, we usually see a conductor waving his arms around, which makes for a big show for the audience, but also signals the individual players in the orchestra when to play and how. Many orchestral musicians prefer the comfort of having a conductor’s cues. Others claim that after enough practice they can play flawlessly without the strong hand waving. In Indonesian gamelan music, there is no such conductor. All participants play together.
The parallel I draw here is between a centrally planned economy and a laissez-faire approach. Is it possible that the man in front of the audience is not as critical of the performance as his last bow might suggest? Egalitarians with an aversion to central planning might be inclined to say “Yes.” I am not here to insert my opinion into that argument, but rather to introduce the first metaphor as a supporting illustration for my second.
Hot Potatoes and Musical Chairs work on a similar mechanic, but in reverse. In a game of hot potato, the goal is to get the potato out of your hands as quickly as possible so that you are not left holding it when the music stops. In a game of musical chairs, the goal is to sit down in a seat as soon as the music stops.
Many of us have fallen for the illusion that we are unable to understand the current economic game of hot potato. The top players, of whom there are few left, have developed highly sophisticated moves and terminology to describe the way they pass the potato from hand to hand. Quantitative easing and credit swaps are excellent examples. As the game increases in dizzying verbal complexity, the rest of us are simply spectators with less stake on the outcome.
What I am witnessing from the President of the United States to the President of the United States and from one Federal Reserve Chairman to the next Fed Chairman is undoubtedly a round of hot potato. They take charge of the potato with force, but they know for sure that one of them will be left with the potato. The potato in the metaphor is, of course, debt. The US national debt is currently approaching thirty trillion dollars ($30,000,000,000,000), and this is just one of the many balance sheets involved in the mess. Writing or saying the word “trillion” doesn’t have the same effect as looking at the zeros, does it? Trying to actually visualize what a trillionth of a physical object looks like can help understand how hot this potato actually is. Unfortunately, the player holding the potato when the music stops isn’t the only one who has to deal with the absurdity of this situation. Every living human being on this planet will bear the burden of the crumbling tower of debt that our political and financial establishments have created.
Every presidential administration and every political party points the finger at its opposition, claiming that they are the root cause of our current dilemma. The truth is that they are all responsible for the circumstances we find ourselves in. Fans of both teams will be biased in one way or another, but if you look objectively at America’s legislative and fiscal history, you will find a huge flaw in both. sides of the aisle.
Some will disagree, but it’s my opinion that hot potato is no fun anymore. The rules have become very convoluted, the number of players determining the outcome has gradually decreased over time, and frankly, I don’t care much for the original concept.
When I think back to my playground, I remember situations where most of the kids in the sandbox were playing a game that I wasn’t very interested in. I had options at the time. I was free to keep to myself and not interact with anyone, but that really defeated the point of going to the playground to begin with. I could reluctantly play the game with others even if I didn’t like it. Or I can start a new game and demonstrate to others why it was more fun than the last one.
It is clear that the global economy deals with risks far beyond what is considered the most “fun”. We also consider standard of living, individual freedom, life expectancy, infant mortality, warfare and famine for the first time.
For now, let’s just look past the grim reality and focus on fun. Today’s global economy maintains a state where a vast majority of the world is watching a game that is not fun for them. A simple measure of this can be inequality tracked over time. As of now, a very small percentage of participants have realized that there is an alternative game available. This percentage does not include all bitcoin users, but only those bitcoin users who truly understand the potential of what they have.
21 million chairs are placed in a circle and the music plays. Lucky for us, we don’t have to wait for the music to stop before sitting down. In our current version of the game, it is not necessary to have an entire chair to succeed, but not having access to a chair at the end would be a bad result. These chairs are divisible by 100 million and each player has a chance to access a portion of the chairs. Having more than one chair can give you the opportunity to seat others you care about, or you can hoard them yourself. Such is the nature of the game.
Many people today have no idea how musical chairs work and are still fixated on the game of hot potato. There are those who have no coin. Some people have one foot in every game and wonder if they want to continue playing hot potato or if they want to dedicate themselves to musical chairs. There are “cryptocurrency” doublers. Some people are well focused on musical chairs, but still work to collect more chairs while risking the chairs they already have. Anyone who trades bitcoin or tries to earn interest on it falls into that category. Using a cold wallet naturally locks the chairs so no one else can sit on them. It’s the players who have already won.
Part of the fun is that while the international economic orchestra is playing, we don’t know exactly when the music stops. There are those who want to say that the music doesn’t have to stop. There are those who say that the hypothetical debt ceiling is infinite. They have never heard the music stop or thought about how events might unfold if it did.
I made my choice about which game I wanted to play some time ago because I think the music will inevitably stop. It could have happened in 2008, but maybe we’ll get an encore. There are no absolute limits to encores, and technically the debt ceiling could be infinite, but do any rational people think these things could go on forever?
At the moment, the conductor seems to be pushing harder and harder, flailing and sweating. Musicians fall out of their chairs from exhaustion, and the impression of harmony is becoming an avant-garde nightmare. Labor shortages, commodity fluctuations, extreme speculation, price increases and overwhelming anxiety are the result of a global system pushed to the brink.
Who else is looking forward to some peace and quiet?
This is a guest post by Maxx Mannheimer. Opinions expressed are entirely their own and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of BTC Inc. or Bitcoin Magazine.
