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Comment by RCitronsBroker | Hacker News Reader

Banks are investment vehicles that utilize a novel structure (being a bank) to enjoy the investment edge of, in case of failure, being able to hold customers money hostage, thereby strongarming the government into bailing them out to avoid the risk of financial mayhem.

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I appreciate the sarcasm. Of course it would take a lot more to prevent the money being held hostage than making it illegal. The whole concept of fractional-reserve banking would have to be abandoned. Whether you like the idea or not, we're stuck with it, there's no way to change it at this point.

I can't believe Im reading this comment on 2023!

For TEN YEARS we have all had the ability to be our own bank. TEN YEARS ago I was telling people that within a year people would be carrying their net worth in their pocket and everyone would be their own bank in 5.

Now, TEN YEARS later we still have people bemoaning the fack we are "dependent of banks".

Lol, we are dependent on banks like a heroin addict is addicted to his fix, their cheap, easy free money. Banks are a sickness.

If you refer to bitcoin, that‘s not new, you could with withdraw and store cash before. Or even gold. Or other small assets, such as art. Bam, no banks. And all of those options are as good or better than crypto.

At least as long as you can‘t pay taxes in crypto and can‘t pay most services.

It's hard to read between the lines. "Be your own bank" in particular is a specific form of finance woo that gets peddled (also under the terms "infinite banking", "cash flow banking", etc). All of those are layers on top of really, really crappy life insurance policies.

But the "hold net worth in pocket" part does sound like crypto.

Correct - it's legalized extortion for all intents and purposes.

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