Only problem is, fiat is better at most of the "good-natured" crime too.
The only application I can even think of where cryptocurrency is actually better than fiat is ransomware. Actually I suppose any kind of ransom payment might benefit from using crypto, as there's no risky physical cash handover for police to intercept. Seems like it could be equally useful for kidnappers as ransomware hackers.
But I can't think of single non-ransom transaction where fiat isn't better than crypto. Legal or otherwise.
For example when buying illicit substances, I don't see why I would want to pay extra to make the transaction traceable and public?
Without incriminating myself too much, uh, let's just say I've seen considerable volumes of illegal business conducted with physical fiat cash, to a degree that likely would have been more difficult with crypto
Crypto has uniquely allowed the huge uptick in ransomware.
Before they had to figure out some way to get paid using the banking system without getting caught. These days maybe they would be asking for $50 million in iTunes gift cards, I don’t know. But it was a hurdle.
Once Cryptocurrencies started to get well known ransomware embraced it incredibly strongly. A far far more anonymous payment method that any random company or person could pay through?
That is such a fallacious argument that crypto bros love to trot out. If you look at the ratio of crime to total transaction, then crime makes up a tiny portion of what is happening in real money. Meanwhile, the situation in crypto is the other way around: Actually useful transactions are almost negligible, while >99% of what is happening is speculation, gambling, and crime. If you could shut down the entire crypto ecosystem, literally nothing of value would be lost.
I think you underestimate how much speculation, gambling and crime happens in the fiat ecosystem. The forex, just to name one thing, is $7.5T exchanged a day.
In comparison, it’s estimated that Americans spend about $10T per year. I don’t have the numbers worldwide but America is a big piece of the cake.
So, speculation is vastly higher than regular spending, even for “regular money”.
Do you really not understand that the forex market has several real use cases and serves an actual purpose. Unlike crypto, it doesn't primarily or solely exist to facility crime and speculation. If you somehow shut down the forex trade, the global economy would experience severe disruptions. If you shut down crypto, nobody in the real economy would even notice.
crypto is a kind of live estimate of the frustration with government restrictions on using one’s own property. that in itself seems to have some social value.
in the US, banks will question you if you try to withdraw your own cash from your own bank account past a certain limit set decades ago and never adjusted while the dollar continues to lose value.
