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Comment by PragmaticPulp | Hacker News Reader

Honestly, why?

My credit card pays me 2% to use it.

If there’s a problem with my transaction, I click some buttons and the card company reversed the charges.

If I lose my card, I call them up and get another one overnight without losing all my money.

Why would I give all of that up, pay exchange fees on both ends of a transaction, pay transaction fees (however small), and wait longer for my transactions to clear?

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The parent comment is making a philosophical/ethical point - there is a lot of power concentrated into two private companies (Mastercard and Visa). They are the gatekeepers to being able to take payments, without them you can't have consumer income, and they make moral judgements that make it hard to operate certain kinds of (legal) businesses.

Sure, but why not use a stablecoin cryptocurrency?

Why do we need to invent an all-new alternative currency and asset class just to use these technologies? Why do I have to invest in 1 of 1000s of altcoins just to arbitrary change numbers in a shared ledger?

Because the US monetary policy and inflation, and USD not being backed by anything, and because people don't want this power in corruptable governments.

This is not even some dispited facts (that this is one of major reasons for why some people want a new currency), this thing has been discussed over and over into oblivion, since the beginning of cryptocurrencies. It is a question that has been answered millions of times at this point. You just haven't researched any of it.

I regularly invoice internationally. I can get a crypto payment through with a small transaction fee (a few cent for $20k) which clears in ~5 minutes, or I can get a payment that takes several days to clear with a larger fee. Crypto works perfectly for me!

Or you could use any of the far cheaper options for international payments (Transferwise, etc)... why do cryptocurrency enthusiasts think that all international payments need to be done via Western Union?

That's a $7.50 charge, this is cheaper. I do however use those methods if the client won't pay in crypto.

Taking the bigger picture, those rewards and disputes aren't free. These things get paid for by transaction fees, cardholders that carry balances, and vendors taking a loss. On the whole, prices for everything go up, but people fortunate enough to have "good" credit cards get a slight discount at the expense of those who don't.

I'm not necessarily saying this system is better or worse than some alternative, just pointing out that it's not all upside.

I don't think anyone would argue that you should stop using your credit card if it's working well for you and you're very happy with it. But of course, credit card companies are only solvent because on average they're not paying their users to use it. Miss one or two bills, or make one big purchase that you wouldn't have without the credit line, and you'll likely wipe out all the rewards you've "earned."

You can't get deplatformed from $whateverCoin like you can with credit cards.

Most people can't put >$20,000 on their credit card and large money transfers over traditional financial institutions (wires/ACH) at best take many hours or days.

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