But governments are unique in the use and concentration of power. There's no doubt corporations take on a government-like power structure but a person can quit a corporation, a person cannot quit their government.

Do you think government IS society? I don't.

Yeah, no. Developing economic models is tough. Getting a lot of data from different countries and finding the casual relationships (through government reports that are probably lies) could take a long time. It might be fun though.

1. Yeah, but a lot of Marxist theory wasn't necessarily correct. Marx was right that the aristocracy was being replaced by industry. I think he was also right about his concept of ideology, that being certain classes determine what others think to exploit them. But Marx's solution was to inflate a central organization that redistributes profits from industry which is a phase of "brute communism". Marx said after "brute communism" there would be "absolute communism" which would consist of man as free from factory work and able to spend all his time pursuing his creative interests. The redistributing organization makes it's own ideology though, so his solution doesn't work. His labor theory of value in Das Kapital has been replaced by laws of scarcity in economics.

2. A lot of the government/populace relationship is parasitic. Every single cent that government takes in taxes originates somehow from people that actually make some good, or service the people that produce things. There is however problems with a lack of uniform law systems proposed by some anarchists, because if law isn't generally codified, personal protection agencies could get into a lot of conflict.

3. I think it would take a lot of studying to do that. Every government/economic relationship is different. It depends on GDP, private vs. public sector employment, the central bank's monetary policy and all the government interventions.

The free market's great. But, government aligns with business through corporatism. Society is however in a technological revolution. Every economic revolution in mankind has lead to a change in political and social roles. Wheat brought an agricultural revolution 11,000 years ago that produced the idea of property. The industrial revolution was kind of mislead by Marxism but I think libertarianism is the outcome of technology. People can talk easier, see through the lies of ideology easier and self-govern better through social networking. The rarest thing in the world is someone motivated sincerely to tell the truth, almost everything comes with something to benefit the one talking. Agorism is ethical, Bitcoin is great because through crypto-currency individuals have an out from Keynesian economists. I just think everyone that agrees with less government should work together but the ring of power will make some power-lusters try to institutionalize libertarianism to their benefit.

Goverment size depends on several factors, not just the percentage of GDP it consumes. Economies with qualified human capital and technological advance will be able to sustain the government's siphoning of funds. The specific political institutions, such as democracy or dictatorship, don't determine size of government. It's indicative of government size but not conclusive.

Governments are only institutions that capitalize on the monopolization of force and everything that the government has was taken from producers and workers. Of course government size determines economic conditions because if governments take more through taxes or inflate the money supply it profits on everyone's lose. Every country's economic-government relationship is highly relative which makes model building difficult. If an economy is strong and has qualified human capital it'll persevere longer and could maintain growth. Plus, governments manipulate employment rates and economic growth figures to keep the populace pacified.

The idea of do-it-yourself libertarianism is a good one but it shouldn't be a total strategy, more like one tactic involving several others incorporating a total strategy to reach a more libertarian world. You don't believe people should break the law? There's no way that DIYL will succeed if people aren't willing to break the law. The government will try to stop anything that gets too successful if they don't control it.

Are you familiar with Konkin's idea of counter-economics? Basically he claims that a free society will evolve out of the black market. I don't agree that this is the solution either because black marketeers profit off of their good/service being scarce. Nothing against agorists, voluntarist or anarchists. I just think every strategy needs to work with one another.

Simple thread, simple question. I recently had someone question me on this. I know many transactions can but what so far is the highest range?

Thanks, lassdas. I was in a hurry to post this and grabbed a link I was looking at in place of the correct one. ShireSilver gave the one I meant to put up.

During Liberty Forum 2013 the first Bitcoin ATM was used. Even though I live in New Hampshire (Free State Project!) I didn't get to go to Liberty Forum this year. None the less I know many individuals that used the Bitcoin ATM and said it worked great by using a live connection to Mt.Gox. Here are a few articles:

http://reason.com/blog/2013/02/26/atm-makes-bitcoin-even-easier-to-access

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-57570925-38/need-bitcoins-this-atm-takes-dollars-and-funds-your-account/

Enjoy

With the introduction of a Bitcoin and the possibility of large impacts on financial institutions it becomes obvious that new economic conditions are going to result. You have already read speculation on Bitcoin and inflation/deflation in a basic way but that is not what I am going to mention here (nor deflationary spirals). I am talking specifically about a new economic condition caused primarily by introducing a competing currency to the current monopolized fiat currency market that our governments oh so love.

The quantity theory of money applies economic laws of scarcity to currency. The more scarce a demanded item is, the more valuable that item becomes. If scarcity increases, value increases. If scarcity decreases, value decreases (It's obvious but should be mentioned). When applied to Keynesian-cult economics or a monetary printing philosophy its the expansion and contraction of credit.  Currency provides a service, it provides a medium of exchange, unit of account and store of value. If another currency like Bitcoin is introduced that provides this service better then that currency will gain in value because demand increases. Simultaneously the currency that is less valuable will decrease in value because it is less demanded. The introduction of competition in currency creates an inflation/deflation relationship between the two. If we are talking about fiat currency competition than the better currency would hypothetically inflate less.

What happens when Bitcoin grows in popularity? What happens when a critical mass is reached and awareness gets out? If consumers look at the two currencies for their merits, Bitcoin or another crypto-currency will win. Fiat currency does have government backing and a history and consumers have a psychological attachment (most consumers) but Bitcoin out competes in other areas. When Bitcoin grows in popularity the price will shoot up because demand will shoot up. This will cause high deflation for Bitcoin. Simultaneously consumers will dump their dollars into the market, replacing them with Bitcoin and their demand for currency with Bitcoin. Fiat currency supplies will increase and inflation will increase.

What happens? More consumers see that if they get a dollar today it wont be worth as much tomorrow but if they get a Bitcoin today it will be worth more tomorrow. More consumers will purchase Bitcoin, demand will increase, value will increase and more will get rid of their dollars, demand will decrease and value will decrease. This inflation/deflation relationship will result from competing currency. The result = the best currency wins.

Prices will stabilize across markets. If prices get comparatively cheaper on one market more purchases will occur leading to higher demands, more scarcity and more value. If prices were to get comparatively high more selling would occur on that market, more supply, less scarcity and less value.

I was interested in this phenomenon myself. In financial markets there exists something called an arbitrageur. An arbitrageur takes advantage of price differentials in different markets. An example would be someone purchasing a boat in one country to only sail the boat to another market and sell it at a higher rate. Since the individual would be taking advantage of price differentials by profiting they would be an arbitrageur.

I wondered if anyone could act as a Bitcoin arbitrageur by taking advantages of momentary price differentials in Bitcoin exchange markets. This would be difficult because markets tend to balance out with the macro Bitcoin market quickly. It is possible to make some money put because of the balancing factor it wouldn't be much. The highest likelihood would be an arbitrageur that sells exclusively to individuals (two people can make a market). Arbitrageurs help to balance price differences in markets by working with principles of supply and demand.

Thanks!

Hey everyone. I'm looking for a chart or table illustrating the change in BTC price compared to dollars. I have been looking because I'm attempting to create my own chart in excel for a project of mine. Can anyone help me out? I've looked for a quite awhile but I cannot find a good resource.

I understand the scriptSig and scriptPubKey mostly now. What happens in a transaction is A private key goes through the process of ultimately proving that the address the BTC was "sent" to matches. This initially "signs" it but then it must be verified with the public-key. The public-key then also verifies the signature and provides further evidence that the signature is valid. This is now open to go to the scriptPubKey portion of the script that ultimatly just specifies which address is the recipient of the BTC or signature. Within the output is also the quantity sent. Then when this is received by the new owner they have to go through the same input process, prove possession of the address storing the value, etc., etc., thus the system acts as a series of electronic signatures.

Looking at the necessary things for the input portion of a transaction, I see that they are 1) the previous tx 2) the index and 3) the scriptSig. I understand the scriptSig now(In a basic way I believe) and the index, which just refers to the specific output of the tx in question. I don't understand however how the "previous tx" represents the previous transaction(sounds strange but let me explain). Does the previous tx represent a hash of the finished signature of the previous tx? And how is this used as an essential part of the input.

I have a few little theories. Maybe the "previous tx" section of an input is just a hash of the referenced output address? Again, maybe it's just a hash of the previous tx signature? But then, I think, scriptPubKey only gives the output address. If scriptPubKey gives more than just the output address I think it would explain this last piece of the puzzle and I'd understand the basics of the script process. My impression is that scriptPubKey just contains the value and the output address.

Not very long and I'm back with more questions. I've learned quite a bit about Bitcoin through my pursuits on here and now I have more technical questions. Right now I'm studying the scriptSig of the input portion of a transaction and the scriptPubKey of the output portion of a transaction. I've found some answers and understand aspects but others I don't.

Pertaining to the scriptSig I see the two aspects, public-key and the signature. I a m comfortable with the public-key aspect. When you try to spend BTC you refer back to the output of the previous tx and the program hashes your public-key thus finding the your address and since the preceding output sent the BTC to your address it is verified you have the key. That seems simple to me, now at least.

When it comes to signature portion of it I'm lost. I know that somehow your private-key you provide verifies your public-key through hashes. This makes sense, I understand how that happens. My question is how do you provide your private-key to the input of your tx to process it and find a line-up with your public-key without putting your private-key in the record? Does the process just use the private-key but do nothing else with it? Also I know you sign a hash of the tx and I get how the hash is made from the tx. But what exactly is that signature? Is it a hash of a combination of a your private and public-key? I found this information:

"The script contains two components, a signature and a public key. The public key belongs to the redeemer of the output transaction and proves the creator is allowed to redeem the outputs value. The other component is an ECDSA signature over a hash of a simplified version of the transaction. It, combined with the public key, proves the transaction was created by the real owner of the address in question. Various flags define how the transaction is simplified and can be used to create different types of payment."

here: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Transactions

and I'm trying to understand the italicized part.

I'm not sure. Do I have control over pinning it as the creator or is that a moderator decision? I'll pin it if I can.

Great. Thanks DannyHamilton and thanks DeathAndTaxes. I learned a lot, you guys helped a lot. I might have more questions a little while in the future but I'll call this one a wrap. You guys know your stuff.

Oh, so a person can send in one transaction to many different places thus creating many different outputs(or in the case of change). When the person receives that payment and then spends it they need to reference the transaction that sent the payment to them. Since there can be many outputs in that transaction they need to specify the exact output in that transaction which is represented by the index.

Alright, I see. Does the index reference the value (BTC) of the referenced output? I think I really get the coinbase now and the private-key, public-key and address. When I first started looking into this I thought that I private-key and public-key was always retained as the SOLE keys that a person has but I see now they're generated with each new address and keys are just stored.

I see. When you create a new address in a wallet application, say, it really creates a new private-key that's a 256 bit unit. Then from that the public-key is formed from a series of hashes and from the public-key another series of hashes creates the address. That means it's always possible to deduce from the private-key what the public-key and address are because you can run the private-key through the series of hashes to get the result. That means that anyone with possession of the private-key has access to the address but knowledge of the address wont yield any knowledge of the private key because of the mathematical impossibility of inducing back up through the hashes.

Also, with the coinbase tx, the scriptPubKey is kind of replaced by another script that handles sending the earner the BTC and this is ultimatly verified through miners working for BTC + transaction fees. What does an index deal with in the index portion of a transaction? I know above for the coinbase transaction it doesn't matter much but what about the others? Also, if anyone wants to put in any input on scriptPubKey and scriptKey meaning I'd be grateful. I keep asking more questions even after you guys do a good job answering other ones but it's like the moment I realize the meaning of one thing it yields five other questions about the deeper nature of the concept.

I understand! So the coinbase transaction is just an output with no signatures that is rewarded to the person solves the hash which then gets transferred to the corresponding person's address in which they sign it while sending it which officially claims the reward. Is that about right? The address is also the hash of a public key.

When each new address is created does that create a new public and private key or is a person's private key always retained and reused no matter the change in the public key? Now I understand the coinbase transaction, the money supply creation, and more but the last thing is just what the creation of a new address entails.

Seriously, thanks everyone who helped to understand so far. I just couldn't conceptualize before the notion of creating something from nothing(the question of reality that still and will forever plague man) but I see now the nature of it in relation to BTC.