Big governments and the institutions that align behind them -- big banks and big unions -- have scaled up the campaign against Bitcoin and Uber recently. Russia has been added to the list of countries that are trying to limit the spread of Bitcoin, as London is added to the list of local and national governments that banned Uber's operations.
There’s a good reason big governments have been going after Bitcoin and Uber. They are innovations that challenge the status quo, the power of elites to write the rules that advance their own interests at the expense of the people at large.
Bitcoin has emerged as a "people's currency," an alternative to national currencies, freed of the control of central banks and banks. And that means a loss of seigniorage income for governments—the benefits derived from printing money and from controlling the economy, as discussed in a previous piece here.That's why big governments from China to Russia -- and smaller governments like Venezuela -- have been trying to crush it. How? By banning Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs), by closing Bitcoin exchanges, and by going after Bitcoin developers.
And it seems they are succeeding it, with the digital currency having lost close to 30 percent of its value in a matter of days.
| Coin/Investment Trust | Change 24H* |
| Bitcoin (BTC) | -1.05% |
| Ethereum (ETH) | 0.62 |
| Litecoin (LTC) | .72 |
*As of Friday September 22, 2017 at 9 pm
The rise of Bitcoin also means that banks are losing control of the money that flows between central banks and the economy, and the interest income and fees associated with them. A Bitcoin economy, for instance, can foster peer to peer lending that substitutes for traditional lending, where banks collect the “interest rate spread,” the difference between the interest rate they charge depositors and the rate they charge borrowers.
Then there's Uber, which has emerged as “people's transportation company,” an alternative to traditional local taxi monopolies whereby taxi unions determine who will be in this business, for how long, and how much consumers will pay--with local governments taking their cut in the form of medallion fees.
Uber has also emerged as an alternative to inefficient mass transportation systems, usually owned and controlled by local governments in a cozy arrangement with public employee unions. That's why some big local, regional, and national governments refuse to license Uber or bring its standards to those of taxi unions
By Panos Mourdoukoutas
Forbes
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