Topic: We once had a barter system here, but the government smashed it (Read 510 times)

Wow, what crap country do you live in. Maybe instead of calling their own people criminals, they should do something about the situation. How audacious of them to point fingers when they can't even get the economy doing anything. Surely this trading couldn't have affected the government that many hands, if it had then the government was not a very good one, to begin with, and, failed you from the start. Making trading banned. I have never heard of such a thing. You can trade whatever you want for anything else you want so long as both parties agree on it.



They were not "forced" They chose to. Exchanges like that shouldn't be involved in crypto and neither the fools who use them.

The barter system is a very old way of exchanging commodities. We cannot just barely stay into something wherein we can seek improvement to give better service to the people. With the presence of the concept of money involve for exchanges of commodities we are benefiting on nourishing and making our own economy to gain from those transactions not just because we owe some sort of products we have using barter system is that we will making it stay for long. The needs of the generation changes as the time goes by so there are provisions that are changing old ways to make it more beneficial for the sake of all that is being done by the government. As for the relation to Bitcoin and crypto, government will not be totally smashing it. It will just be regulated on usage and transaction being done due to their own reasonings that is said for the good of all.

In my opinion, there are advertisements in newspapers for sale and purchase in any country and this activity is not considered tax evasion, since goods of significant value still need to be certified by a notary or otherwise registered, in which tax is withdrawn. For small household transactions, tax is not charged.
As for barter transactions, they are really not welcomed by the government, since money does not participate in this and in this case it does not stimulate the development of the country's economy.
However, all this has practically nothing to do with bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, except that in either case, the state seeks to control all processes.

If something is not benefiting the government, they are always looking for ways that they are going to crack it down. As for BTC, I think it’s going to be a difficult case for them, they are not going to be able to crack it down and I believe they know that, so what they are trying to do this time around is to come into the platform and look for way to control it, they are doing their possible best.

Very soon whether you are making use of custodial or noncustodial wallet, they will be looking for ways to sip some information about you, especially those that are making use of custodial wallets, they are going to be the ones that will be used mostly by the government to extract information.

This is certainly not just xcaret's wild imagination.

From where I live, something has recently made into the national news. It was a local barter community which was based on social media, Facebook in particular. It's a community with tens of thousands of members. All kinds of stuff were posted there for barter. No money involved.

Somebody who needs something will post something else that he/she owns and is willing to let go for the sake of that which he/she needs. This started during the height of the pandemic. A lot of people lost their jobs and livelihood. They've got no money. Things went back to basic all of a sudden. Barter became the refuge of a lot of people, although other stuff relating to hobbies and whatnot are also posted there.

WOW!!. While these things seem out of question in today's connected world, a lot of such things have happened in the past. I didn't know that people put so much value on their credit rating so as to leave their property rather than default on the mortgage.

This is a very good example though that why it is so important to maintain bitcoin privacy. With the clear transaction trails, it will be easy to link all sort of BTC that people are earning today to some sort of questionable transaction (or atleast those that seem questionable). So would people risk getting doxxed and sued by authorities because of the KYC on some exchange or they would let go off that crypto to some sort of Govt treasury or auction of "confiscated good".

Events like these are reminders that how KYC can make you lose all that you have built through sheer hard work.

That's only a wild imagination and it will never happen for sure. Barter only needs a real value of the product or the item that you barter from another product, this has been done a long time ago and you think if this isn't good then for sure it will exist until now and never vanished.

Digital and cash currencies will the only way to determine the value of the product to be exchanged, not just the barter system.

Maybe you can avoid paying tax by using bitcoin and do the same with a barter system, but if there is another way that bitcoin will taxable I will not hesitate my self to give it to my government. Paying tax is just helping to have a progress in your country, by collecting tax it means that you have contributed your part for your country's improvement, look at the US, (the most established country) they are very strongest country because they are very of paying tax, people should pay their obligation.

I don't remember if the internet was even in use at that time , if it was , it was in it's infancy .

The reason the barter system I was mentioning failed was because We found each other by looking at that heading in the Buy & sell paper . Once it stopped allowing those ads ,it was hard for strangers to contact one another with their needs or services .
Yes the barter system still goes on ,as does the " I don't need a receipt if your not charging me the tax" .
Both save money .
Come to think of it someone should start a web site ,in every city in every country where people can advertise what their services are and others advertise what they are looking for ..No cash deals , barter only . It would be a hit once it got going . The key would be Barter only !!  I know that craigslist and others have the occasional ad where someone wants to trade . But I'm talking about Barter only ..           

Why should your public barter system die along with that paper's free ads? That's a huge leap.

Times change. Change happens all the time. I know not where you're coming from but I am almost certain you have internet in your country. Ads on print media is not everything there is to ads. The online world has now dominated people's lives. Perhaps that paper ad's death is just timely. I mean, the modern times are offering more venues and tools and ways for people to deal with each other in whatever business they're at.

In my locality, barter has been revived during the pandemic. And it has made use of social media platforms.

Don't worry about media's portrayal of Bitcoin. Bitcoin doesn't give a damn.

With so many people making big profit from crypto currency I doubt the government will crack bitcoin down. Why would they do this if they can take a big slice of your pie through taxes? Not only them, but also the exchanges which are already charging exorbitant fees and all the kinds of middlemen you can think about. And of course, the government is earning twice: from your profits and from middlemen profit. And if the government earns twice, it means you are paying twice. Tis way bitcoin is never going to be cracked down.

Bitcoin is decentralized, but so far its energy is not enough to get rid of government supervision, unless one day the government's credibility disappears and cannot affect our lives, but this is impossible in the short term.

If the future of btc is good, it's very likely that the government find trouble with us or find others ways to take btc away from us. They will be the final holder of btc and holder of all major wealth.

This is likely the first payment and transaction were. Before money, people use to barter for transactions and the price is determined by each value of each good or service. And until now, in my area, there is still kind of transaction, but only a few old people do this depending on the needs.
And moreover, at that time, there was also payment transaction using coin (in which it was real from gold or silver) that they were very valuable until now.

However, after first introduced by China, paper money was issued and had been being developed until now. I don't know what was the first reason for issuing the paper money for the transaction. However, it is also probably because of the development era, technology, and also widening the transaction coverage.
And after the era of development, paper money is the king of the payment.
But now, it seems like the world is changing again because digital money is here and probably will take over the paper money. Remember, that is the digital money (not oy for cryptocurrency but all digital money that is issued also by the government. 

What they did with the barter system in your country is definitely awful and all but I don't see how it could be connected to crypto now. As far as I know, people are more wary of what they get their news from and since we all know media can't be relied upon anymore, we're taking steps to avoid media dependency. Stock Trader giants on the other hand, now those are the ones that are a big pain in bitcoin's back. This is generally true, but if a major country is removed of bitcoin's reach and service, not only will it be bad for their investments but it would also be bad for bitcoin, one of the first things to look out for would be the massive panic selling, which will then be accompanied by the ban which will definitely affect bitcoin's price.

Semobo , I just googled Calgary real estate offices, tons came up, with phone numbers too.
 Those houses were valued around $85,000 up to over a million.
 
Owners had no employment As the pasted post below explains ,so they were not able to make the mortgage payment .They would lose the house and their credit rating . So being there was a law here in Alberta that any residential mortgage could be assumed ,they sold their house to those who advertised that they would buy the house and save the seller's credit rating .   The new buyer became the one on the mortgage ,and that is who lost his credit rating .
Oh, I just read what I had posted , you are right ,it looks like the houses full price was $1 . No they were still worth a lot of money if a buyer could be found. actually, the buyer was only taking over the mortgage for one buck .
The home still had the huge mortgage on it ..The seller lost what equity was in the home ,but he would loose it and his credit rating if the bank repo'd it . The law has now changed , about ten years ago they stopped allowing people to take over a mortgage with out the banks approval..   .I'll paste what I wrote earlier   

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I'm in the province of Alberta ,western Canada , until about 10 years ago In this province only ,any residencial property mortgage could be assumed. I could ( and did ) buy a house with a mortgage ,then walk into the bank that held the mortgage ,and have them transfer it into my name . They didn't like it ,but nothing they could do about it.

In 1982-1984 we had a horrible recession when our prime minister ( the father of this putz who is running things now ) decided to create a huge tax on crude oil , since Alberta ran on oil royalties , all the drilling rigs left for USA, Oil Sands layed of people to, Oil explorartion stopped also . So many people had moved here from other parts of the country ,that finding themselves out of work, no government assistance ,they moved back to where they had lived before coming here .the glut of houses on the market caused a 35% drop in prices.
To save their good credit standing they would sell their house for 1$ and the buyer took over the mortgage. leaving the seller in good standing at the credit bureau !

But the good part is yet to come  ( how about this you bank haters? ) .
The buyer would rent the house out for very attractive price ,but not pay the bank a cent ( sounding good? ) after 3 months of threatening letters to the new holder of the mortgage the bank would take him to court , it was easy to stall the banks off in court for 9 months before the sheriff came and physically booted the tenents out and reclaimed the house . In those days you could rent a house out for $500 ,which was attractive even with the recession .
So for one buck you got the house and mortgage in your name and $500 free and clear for 9 months  $4,500 on each of the houses you bought .
Your credit went to zero but who cared , good blue collar wage was $11 per hour , less than $1,800 per month before taxes ,so you can see the incentive . My lawyer bought over 200 of them .   

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Only if you understand that government can't actually eradicate bitcoin worldwide. You need to read the impact the bitcoin has made. Before, the tension was drawing about bitcoin and other crypto been ban in some countries especially China but up till date crypto is getting much more attention day in day out and the recent bull run has uncovered a lot of things. Don't be surprise if some countries start to create their own crypto asset because it was reported before that some countries in Europe are already doing this.

I read your comment about people sold their house for a buck but asked to take over the remaining mortgage by the buyer which doesn't means the value of house is a buck. And also google didn't gave me any results about this but it could be true when there is no employment opportunity then there is no other way than migrating to a different place but if they have any loan on their house then they have to make some settlement or it will destroy their credit history.

Semobo, I may be overly sensitive ,to your comment " No one is going to sell their house for a dollar unless it is a haunted place."
 Someone on this thread asked if I was dreaming ,or something about making a movie , meaning It was a lie. ( oh, here is the quote "Did that happened in real life or it is kind of movie. $1 for a house sounds like a folktale."
 
Semobo , I'm sure not thinking you are doubting what I said , I agree in Todays market no houses are being sold for $1 , let alone the hundreds that were sold for a buck back in the recession of 1982- 1984  . At least houses that are today selling for over $400,000 . ( which the $1 houses sell for, and even up to over a million bucks   today)

I explained all this in a post in this thread ,scroll back and look for a lengthy post , if anyone doubts it . Then show me at least the courtesy of one phone call.

Google Calgary Alberta real estate companies .pick one with a lot of offices , ask for the manager ( the new people are to young to have lived through it ) . First read my post in this thread which explains how it all came about . Then ask if everything wasn't exactly what I said happened ..

I don't mean that Semobo doubts what I posted, I certainly agree with him that only a haunted house (today) here in Canada would sell for $1 .
 I'm writing this just for anyone who doubts me, or hasn't read my post explaining to someone else on here how it came about .           

No one is going to sell their house for a dollar unless it is a haunted place. But doing a barter system payment in the 21st century will cut off the taxes to the governments that is why they banned it. We can't comment anything about what government likes to ban because they got the power and can ban anything that they wanted.

Bitcoin is likely to be banned as well when people started using it while it can be continued to use whether a ban is in place or not because there is no central authority to track down the bitcoin transactions.

You have a point. But I am also in doubt if they will be able to completely have the power to control and regulate cryptocurrency if they are not the ones who made it and who navigates the entire system. But of course, yes, they would have control over their people.

You have seen this "so much bad media" for the past few years, right? You see any difference in anything? Nope, you don't. But things have changed a lot. It is just that people aren't noticing. The government isn't pushing everything in one single day. They are imposing small rules and policies in such a way that people aren't even noticing the changes (all these small changes in a decade together has caused a huge change! People are just too distracted to notice!).
I would say this is one of the strategy the government is taking so that they can bring crypto currencies under their control through regulations without people making any noise.
Nothing we can do. It's inevitable.

It's a big deal when it comes to limit the usage of links on the internet to control bitcoin and it's way too impossible to stop the internet since this modern era of us takes place by using the internet.

^ Bater system was found out that there is no standardized value, you cant completely exchange your one sack of rice into a pair of shoes.
But I cant compare this to the BTC, government did not allow adoption in cryptocurrency just because this is a non-regulated currency, all currencies must be regulated by the government.
Nevertheless, see how the differences between the barter system and the currency and for sure it is different to BTC as a currency.
https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/061615/what-difference-between-barter-and-currency-systems.asp

I'm just a senile old senior ( and half drunk again. here at 3:30 am MT.) ,but was bit coin not originally intended for p2p trading ? I'm not sure that it was ,but The silk road ,and tor, along with what is called the dark web , were what brought it to my attention.

It was several years later that folks started using it as an investment . (I think)

Awe Christ , now I gotta get up n pour me another glass of my homemade booze. all this stress over BTC is causing me to drink .

The government's severe crackdown will inevitably affect the benefits of Bitcoin in the world, but Bitcoin is still on an upward trend worldwide

Fiat markets are government sanctioned monopoly.

Barter system threatens the monopoly of government.

And so naturally they would take steps to protect it.



Elected leaders of the united states might restrict the crypto industry to weaken its economy in contrast to the rest of the world.

While the rest of the world deregulates and offers tax cuts to its crypto industry to strengthen their economy in contrast to the USA.

That seems like the most obvious outcome. Seeing as how the USA tries so hard to kill its own big tech industry and most successful business enterprise and regions like silicon valley. We love economic suicide.




Visit: youtube or a search engine.

Search: houses for sale 1 dollar.

Its surprising how many things that sound like myths and legends turn out to be true, sometimes.

 

What I learned from your story is that it is only barter ads in the paper that were prohibited, but not the barter itself. The government cannot prevent you from interacting with other people, they can't forbid you to make voluntary exchanges between individuals. Trades occurring between people cannot be physically regulated by the government. However, the tools employed to advertise this kind of interaction can easily be by the reason that these intermediaries are subject to such regulation. That is why when dealing with bitcoin it is always suggested to avoid any intermediaries and make P2P transactions instead.

Where was your country OP? I think the government was unfair in that decision,,, but I see it as impossible now for them to stop anyone from trading and bartering on their own. In fact, why not just do that with Telegram or some other app that cannot fall under state surveillance? People do it all the time in this current economy.

davis196
I'm in the province of Alberta ,western Canada , until about 10 years ago In this province only ,any residencial property mortgage could be assumed. I could ( and did ) buy a house with a mortgage ,then walk into the bank that held the mortgage ,and have them transfer it into my name . They didn't like it ,but nothing they could do about it.

In 1982-1984 we had a horrible recession when our prime minister ( the father of this putz who is running things now ) decided to create a huge tax on crude oil , since Alberta ran on oil royalties , all the drilling rigs left for USA, Oil Sands layed of people to, Oil explorartion stopped also . So many people had moved here from other parts of the country ,that finding themselves out of work, no government assistance ,they moved back to where they had lived before coming here .the glut of houses on the market caused a 35% drop in prices.
To save their good credit standing they would sell their house for 1$ and the buyer took over the mortgage. leaving the seller in good standing at the credit bureau !

But the good part is yet to come  ( how about this you bank haters? ) .
The buyer would rent the house out for very attractive price ,but not pay the bank a cent ( sounding good? ) after 3 months of threatening letters to the new holder of the mortgage the bank would take him to court , it was easy to stall the banks off in court for 9 months before the sheriff came and physically booted the tenents out and reclaimed the house . In those days you could rent a house out for $500 ,which was attractive even with the recession .
So for one buck you got the house and mortgage in your name and $500 free and clear for 9 months  $4,500 on each of the houses you bought .
Your credit went to zero but who cared , good blue collar wage was $11 per hour , less than $1,800 per month before taxes ,so you can see the incentive . My lawyer bought over 200 of them .   

I'm sorry to say that,but exchanging goods for goods and services for services is tax evasion indeed,at least in the eyes of government officials.
The legal side of the crypto industry is paying taxes and complying by the KYC policies,so I can't find a reason  why any government would want to ban the crypto companies,which are paying taxes and following the rules.
Selling houses for $1 and walking away?Damn,in which part of the world is this country?
Buying real estate for $1 is a great opportunity,unless that real estate is in Afghanistan or Somalia.

Precisely. It is indeed an old school system which is totally different with Bitcoin.
Government may try to crack Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies.
At the beginning, they may be winning but at the end they will be a loser, Bitcoin is designed to become decentralized that will no one can control it even the government.
Barter system is opposite of paying money, which paying money system or buying items/services comes with payment method that Bitcoin can be use.

Barter system is too complicated for worldwide usage. The majority of people dont have anything to offer except money

The problem with the barter system are actually manner. it will be highlighted below;
1. problem of getting the person who needs what you want to exchange, and has what you need.
2. Problem of ending government revenue through such system.

The first problem was solved via the invention of money, with money you could buy anything without having to exchange another thing for it.

The second, the government needs funds to continue its operation and providing public services. so, banning such batter system would be a good option or looking for a way to tax such transition would be a better option.

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Yes, that is a fact. I believe that the government cannot ban or unfairly regulate what it is generating revenue from. But, i feel that a government would do anything to tackle a system that makes it impossible to generate funds, such as the barter trading. In fact, the problem with the batter system is higher than this...

[moderator's note: consecutive posts merged]

The two situations are not comparable. For starters bitcoin is a global currency while the situation you explained is only a local one. Not to mention that a currency can not be taxed but an investment can and they have already done that so there isn't much left to do.
Besides the situation you explained was in a place where the government was starving for revenue so they had to do something, we aren't in that situation in 90% of the world. And bitcoin is not going to provide any more revenue for the government than it already does (taxing the traders).

What the government might have been preventing was not the trade but the value that the people are trading are disregarded, they might be preventing hoarders that will try to amass quantities of items to sell at a higher price. Calling them tax evaders is a pretty bullshit notion. EU is a union of free countries so free market is a needed thing there, in some countries, corruption and free market is not the best interest for those in power so they do their best into cracking down on this kinds of people uniting together.

It's because back then bitcoin is not yet in the radar of the government, or any agency for that matter. But after the Mt. Gox heist, you will hear a lot of negativity starting to pop up. In the last 5 years or so, government are taking notice, hence KYC/AML verification is now in full effect.

However, this is the best effort they can put forward, they can't really stop bitcoin's trading. One way to do that is to stop internet, but I doubt they will have the power to do that.

which contains me curious from the 150 people, what do they use without the use of technology at this time?
if they are not entrepreneurial technology users, then how are they able to reach the network to every corner of the world?
this sounds like a conspiracy inside the pyramid of Giza in its time. they they planned the promised land conspiracy, by changing the system of exchanging gold for paper money that has inflation.

The crisis in your country and crypto are incomparable.

Any fiat system or crypto is better than any barter system. We are not 2021BC. Even if you can agree on the swap 'prices' in your region, 5km away people will not.

If you haven't noticed, Government is alright trying to control how we trade with exchanges now forcing people to first carry out KYC verification before using their platforms. I wasn't here when Bitcoin started, but I believe there was so much freedom trading Bitcoin back then than it is right now.

Some exchanges are also already being forced to delist certain privacy or anonymity leaning coins like DASH, Monero, ZEC. This all the same as what you just stated in the OP.

This is really strange they did not allow you to trade. What laws were you breaking by bartering?

In the EU you can trade at will for free, without any government interference, even if you make profit. If I remember correctly there's a law in my country which states that used things that belong to you and weren't purchased with the intent to trade like books, tools, clothes, can be sold tax free. You can place ads online and sell them for fiat or cash. That's why people rarely trade. It's much easier to price things.

At this point, I don't think the government will do anything drastically about Bitcoin. Not when institutions are rallying to buy it and billionaires are supporting it. You see... politicans do not rule the world. They are merely puppets. The billionaire Chamath Palihapitiya said it: "there are about 150 people who run the world – [they’re not politicians] anybody who wants to go into politics, they’re all f**king puppets.There are 150, and they’re all men, who run the world. They control most of the important assets and the money flows – they are not the tech entrepreneurs."

I don't think it's comparable to the situation Bitcoin is currently facing. The BTC situation is a new for me: an oppression covered in false support. It's like saying you support drug use while heavily restricting its trading, markets and usage. I see what you did here, but I think the gov hates barter way more than they hate BTC due to the fact that BTC is fully public. No matter how much I want to support BTC, the fact that we do not have even optional privacy makes it an amazing control tool for authorities.

When Bitcoin gets opt-in privacy is the same moment when you'll start seeing the same oppression you have witnessed back in the '80s. For now, they are in fact actually happy about BTC's existence since probanly >90% of the users don't care about privacy or make little mistakes that uncovers their entire history.

Back in the early 1980's My part of the country was in a huge recession. Peoples selling their houses for 1$ and walking away .

A free buy and sell paper had ads offering people to sign up and trade services for services, or goods etc.

 I traded a transmission out of an old car for an overhead garage heater.

I then traded the electrical system to run a grow op to a licensed plumber for his services to install it.

For the special chimney required I traded a electric sewing machine.

There was no crypto back then.

Well this trading started catching on ,there were lots of ads in that free ad's paper from people looking to trade  for all kinds of things .

9 months went by, then the local government started having the media slam the traders for being tax evaders, unpatriotic ,and all the usual BS .

The next thing I knew the free ads paper ran a banner saying no more trade ads allowed.

That was the end of our public barter system .
 
Government crack down . I wonder what this year will be like for BTC with so much bad media ( government )
publicity .