Operation Saylor - Episode 14/120

Hi again and welcome to another episode of the Operation Saylor. This is update number 14, corresponding to August 2023.

If you are reading this for first time, you might want to check Episode 1, where my plan and details are explained. That will get you in context.

Hello again and apologies for the delay. Life kept me away from my computer, hence why this episode of Operation Saylor has come a bit later than usual.

The reason that kept me far from my computer was a several-week trip to an Asian country. The trip has been amazing, and I have observed many of the differences between my home country and this land through Bitcoin and economic lenses. What I have learned makes me both hopeful and pessimistic. But the important thing is that I have learned a lot and seen things I would have never imagined could be true.

The streets of this country are the closest thing I've seen to anarcho-capitalism. There is an astoundingly diverse set of businesses, from fancy ones to very humble street stalls. Some commercial streets can have dozens of stalls in just a few meters, with an impressive life going on in them. All businesses will happily take cash, and actually, most of them will only take cash. This is a stark difference from the situation in Europe, where cash is quickly going down the drain as people give it up. Credit cards are only accepted in some of the more fancy, serious, or large stores. Most street stalls have no licenses and, most surely, pay no taxes at all. Nobody seems to mind this, and policemen walk around happily as part of the scenery. It is obvious that the government surrenders to the fact that this mesh of street commerce is simply uncontrollable and just part of life, and so they tolerate it. Beautiful.

This lack of hard government control over small activities leads to a flourishing free market that offers competitive prices and a wide range of options. You can have lunch for $1 or $100 at restaurants next to each other. "Commodity meals", in the sense that they are pretty standard and widespread, pretty much have standard prices for comparable quality since no stall or restaurant dares to raise prices significantly with respect to its neighboring competitors. Transportation is another great example of a rich market: there are many different options to get from A to B, ranging from simply hopping on a motorcycle as a passenger to booking a luxury Mercedes. This can be done through mobile apps, but it can also be negotiated on the spot on the street. Again, it's all cash-based, even when booking transportation through apps. When observing the locals, it becomes obvious that rides are not reserved for the wealthy classes or the richer tourists, as I've seen in many European cities. Humble people rely on the cheapest transport options, like motorcycle taxis or shared vans. This achieves something that Western leftist governments always dream of but never nail down: removing the need for private ownership of vehicles. Why would I own a motorcycle if I can run my errands for an entire day for roughly the same price as a Mac Menu?

The prevalence of cash is both the consequence of a large part of the population being unbanked and also the reason that this anarcho-capitalism survives. Lots of people in the lower classes and rural areas rely completely on cash and don't have bank accounts or credit cards. Now, this obviously comes with negative consequences for them, since relying fully on cash and not having access to certain financial products is clearly not optimal at all. But at the same time, the collective unbanked mass is what makes any thought of deploying a CBDC wishful thinking. People successfully go on with their lives only with cash and are used to the freedom and simplicity that come with it. Hopefully, cash remains king for the time being and until the Bitcoin ecosystem has developed enough to support the exuberant economic life of the country.

I have enjoyed observing this society during my trip. I've seen things we used to enjoy in Europe that we have now lost. I've seen a mix of modernity without a hyper-financialized society where banks and governments have complete control over everyone's lives. And I've seen how wonderful it is. This makes me hopeful. There are still large chunks of the world where the fiat system has not fully taken control of things, and these resistance points stand in the way of the dystopian 1984 future we all fear. At the same time, I'm sad. I wonder how Europe went wrong. I am also doubtful of whether we can go back on the right track without going through traumatic times and some kind of nasty collapse before. I also think that more open societies like the one I visited are going to overtake us in terms of progress in a matter of a few decades, maybe just a few years. I can't help but feel like I'm on a sinking ship, all while I've just witnessed a brave small town with a buzzing shipyard that's building the ships of the future.

I hope I can visit this country again and learn more about it. In the meantime, I will be concerned with how I can keep my home from falling off the cliff, with the help of Bitcoin and all the plebs out here that are making society a better place.

As always, thanks for reading and I'll see you next month.