Source: Liu Jiaolian
Introduction
Whenever the value of BTC (Bitcoin) is discussed, people tend to fall into endless chatter. controversy. Even if you bring out the three magic weapons, the Austrian School in your left hand and the Horse Sutra in your right hand, and read Keynes in your mouth, you still can't seem to figure out this problem.
Some people say that BTC is worthless garbage.
Some say that BTC is worthless but has a price.
Some say that BTC is valuable because of its scarcity.
Some say that BTC is valuable because it is the product of the condensation of huge electric energy.
Some say that BTC has its value because miners provide security protection with huge computing power.
Some say that BTC is valuable because of gray needs such as money laundering by criminals.
Some say that BTC is valuable because it meets people's needs for value storage and value transfer.
All kinds of things.
Some are from the perspective of production and supply; some are from the perspective of consumption and demand; some are from the perspective of transactions and price discovery. So, does value come from production? Or does it come from demand? We cannot stay on the surface, but go deeper and explore the origin of demand.
The meaning of demand
In economics, the word "demand" usually corresponds to "supply" exists as a concept.
The existence of these two words has a premise, that is, there must first be a market.
To delve deeper into the original logic, we cannot start from the existence of the market and only examine what happened afterwards. However, many people may limit their thinking to the birth of the market. This idea of taking the market as a matter of course is naive and childish.
Friends who know about Internet work may know that there is a famous debate in the product manager community, which is the difference between "need" and "want".
Chinese word formation enlightens us that "demand" is composed of "need" and "quest". "Need" is one's own need, a desire. "Seeking" is the method that can be adopted to obtain the satisfaction of such desires. This method is "begging" rather than "stealing", not "stealing", not "cheating".
Product managers focus on the “need” part in order to explain the intrinsic motivation of human behavior. Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs theory is often mentioned here. Freud's psychoanalysis and libido were even more prominent in guiding the early pornographic and violent business development of the Internet.
Economics does not focus on the “need” part, but only on the “demand” part. As Mises, the master of Austrian economics, said, economics only cares about a person's purposeful behavior, and does not care about the forces and factors that prompt him to act, nor does it care about the purpose of his behavior, whether it is right or wrong, Noble or despicable. (Chapter 1 of Mises's "Human Behavior" The Acting Man)
Therefore, the center of demand lies in the word "seeking". People seek because of need. What you need to talk about is your own needs, and what you need to talk about is external demands. Need is the relationship between things and people, while seeking is the relationship between people. Just as rice can satisfy my desire to be full, this is the relationship between rice and me, it is a need; and when I open the app to order a takeaway and ask for rice from the restaurant, it is the relationship between me and the restaurant, and it is a relationship between people. Relationship is seeking.
The relationship between things and people, the relationship between rice and me, is a natural relationship; the relationship between people, the relationship between a restaurant and me, is a social relationship.
The relationship between things and people defines the use value of things, just like filling my stomach with rice defines the use value of rice; the relationship between people defines the exchange value of things, just like a restaurant The relationship with me defines the exchange value of rice and takeout. What we call value is economic value and exchange value. (Marx’s Capital, Volume 1, Chapter 1, Commodities and Currency)
It can be seen that society comes first, and only then can social relationships between people be created, and only then can value be born. Without society and social relations, there would be no value. In this sense, relationships are values and values are relationships.
When there is society, there is value, and then there is the market. One of the greatest functions of the market is price discovery, which is the expression of value into price, the monetary measurement of value. At this time, currency becomes a sacred totem, and the quantity of currency becomes the best proof of value.
When you work overtime and complete a perfect work task, your boss looks at it, pats you on the shoulder kindly and says, "Young man, you did a great job, and the work results are of great value!" Your boss must not be praising your neat code, beautiful documents, and beautiful data, but the real and subconscious meaning must be: This thing will definitely make the boss a lot of money.
One of the reasons for the psychological grievances of many migrant workers is that their own evaluation standards for work deviate from those of their bosses, resulting in a psychological gap. The beauty and perfection you think you have are worthless if you can't help your boss make a fortune.
The only value of being a worker is how much money you can make for your boss.
The boss only cares about money, otherwise he is not a qualified boss and will be eliminated by the market sooner or later. Money has long since transformed into value itself.
The market has given everyone the most stringent criterion, which is demand. If what you make cannot meet market demand, you won’t make money and it will be worthless.
The extremely clever Sir Keynes focused on the demand itself. As long as money printing stimulates demand, the bosses can make money, creating the illusion that our products are still valuable, thus driving the entire economic machine to rotate. This is Keynesianism that is commonly used in today's world to stimulate economic development.
Keynes’ inner OS: As long as money is printed as hard as possible, shit can rise to the sky.
No matter what sect everyone claims to be in verbally, when it comes to market investment with real swords, real guns, and real money, they all fall at the feet of Keynes. Otherwise, why would investors around the world pay the most attention to the Fed’s monetary policy trends?
Premise of demand
Through the above analysis, we know that the premise of demand is society, value and market.
If everyone was a superman and could do everything by himself without the help of others, then there would be no society and there would be no value.
If there is no peaceful environment, no legal regulations, and robbery, theft and deception are easier than fair exchange, then there will be no market and demand will be rootless.
For example, a tiger wants to eat a rabbit. Is this a need? Obviously not.
But if you want to eat chicken, it is a need. Why? It's not because you can't beat the chicken, but because the chicken has its owner. The relationship between you and the chicken owner is a relationship between people, which defines values and needs. This is the essence and meaning of property rights.
You said you could kill the chicken owner and eat his chickens. Then, you also kill the demand and kill the value of the chicken. When the chicken owner's property rights to the chicken are destroyed, the chicken loses its value and only has the use value of being eaten by you.
Peace requires the restraint of violence, and law is based on the deterrence of punishment. This requires stronger violence than everyone else to use violence against individuals to destroy property rights and destroy Deterrence and punishment for value-based behavior. So there was a country.
The reason for demand is repeated measurement. Instead of using fair exchange methods, other methods such as robbing, stealing, and cheating are used. The cost is higher and the risk is greater, so it is better to return to the market. come from the rules.
If all the above premises are lost, even some are lost, then robbers, thieves and swindlers will flood the world, and the so-called market demand and consumers will disappear.
Economics most of the time only focuses on the market, which leads to people who study economics often intentionally or unintentionally ignoring the various premises outside and above the market, and their thinking is also inconsistent. A blind spot is created.
Bitcoin’s huge computing power is a special form of violence, and Bitcoin’s cryptographic mathematics is a special form of law. These things are exactly what is beyond the market.
This is one of the reasons why many people who are more familiar with economics cannot understand Bitcoin. Because there are too many Bitcoins, it is something that falls into the blind spot of their thinking.
People’s demand for Bitcoin and its value
To sum up, we roughly understand the origin of demand.
So, why do people have real demand for Bitcoin?
Bitcoin provides an alternative to state violence, competes with the latter, and provides people with unique protection of property rights. This is an important prerequisite for forming demand and realizing value.
Can't rob, steal, or cheat, so the only way is fair exchange. Fair exchange, value is realized.
Most altcoins cannot compete with high-level violence. Instead, they rely on state violence to exist. Therefore, it is difficult to become a substitute and competitor for the latter, and cannot provide freedom from state violence. Without the protection of property rights, there is no unique value.
We need to start from the heart, and seek from strength.
Bitcoin uses its indestructible and huge computing power to catalyze people's needs into demand. Demand is further converted into value. Value is further formed into price.
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