Author: Erik Aronesty 2022-07-07 17:37:39
Published on: 2022-07-07T17:37:39+00:00
The discussion among members of the bitcoin-dev mailing list revolves around the security mechanisms in place for Bitcoin. The difficulty adjustment function is found to be insufficient against 51% attacks and censorship. Falling hash rate due to a perpetual 51% attack can lead to a decrease in difficulty and cost of countering censorship, which may result in the censor subsidizing its loss. Inflation-based block rewards do not offer security against censorship but only presume double-spend security. Banks and state monies offer reasonable double spend security while lowering the block size and increasing fee pressure could reduce the burden on node operators and increase double-spend security. Economic forces (people) provide security, not technology, and there is no need for active economic governance by developers or meddlers. The present amount of security is about 1.7% of the total coin supply per year, which is already an amount low enough to be smaller than economic volatility. It is unnecessary to stress about finding an "optimal" amount as a non-zero amount that is easily affordable is sufficient. Changes to inflation are off the table.
Updated on: 2023-06-15T21:28:47.302472+00:00