Ethereum Constantinople Explained
achainofblocks.com
achainofblocks.com
> This new update reduces the mining reward from 3 ETH to 2 ETH which will reduce the yearly inflation of the coin. The goal of this is ultimately to drive the price higher, as we know that when there is less of something it becomes worth more.
This is a common point of view, but not universal and the effect on price has not been brought up in deliberations amongst the core devs AFAICT.
The rationale for lowering the block reward is described in EIP-1234 as:
> In order to maintain stability of the system, a block reward reduction that offsets the ice age delay would leave the system in the same general state as before. Reducing the reward also decreases the likelihood of a miner driven chain split as Ethereum approaches proof-of-stake.
https://github.com/ethereum/EIPs/blob/master/EIPS/eip-1234.m...
Ether is gas, fuel needed on the Ethereum highway. He wants and does things so that less fuel has to be used, leading to a massive supply glut. This means extremely cheap Ether.
At the same time he does things like reducing the block reward from 3 eth to 2 eth, in a seemingly desperate attempt to constrict the supply and stem the cheaper and cheaper prices of eth.
Who complains about cheap gas? Long-only speculators. Nobody within the economy complains about cheap gas.
Do erc20 transfer methods become 10x cheaper? For example
Well it will be obvious after January 14th