Quora Answer: Do You Think Bitcoin Will become a Main Source of Income for Families in 10 to 20 Years?

The following is my answer to a Quora question: “Do you think Bitcoin will become a main source of income for families in 10-20 years?” 

Cryptocurrencies, despite their name, are not really currencies.  Bitcoin is not a currency; it is a token.  There is no immediate liquidity, and there is a limit to the secondary market for this class of assets.  This precludes it from being a currency, a means for the exchange of goods and services.  We have to understand that Bitcoin does not have an intrinsic value in and of itself.  Since it is not backed by a sovereign, we have no viable means to observe a measurable value, let alone predict it with some certainty. 

There is no central bank because the purpose of Bitcoin was to do away with centralised control.  That looked good on paper, but it failed.  Bitcoin is essentially controlled by a few miners with the most computing power, leading to a sort of pseudo-monopoly.  This mining monopoly is stifling its use, blocking ledger transactions.  Also, Bitcoins are finite, limited, as it seems, to 21 million coins.  Bitcoin’s value is because of the mining, not the demand in its use as a means of transaction.  This means once the mining peters out, if there is no viable secondary market, Bitcoin’s value will drop precipitously.  It is estimated that this could end by 2140, or even earlier.  None of the reasons make Bitcoin attractive or viable as a means of income.