As far as I can see the properties that real estate lacks, are now created by the modern communication systems.
Like...density? Gold is one of the most dense elements, so it is easier and cheaper to store. It is more compact and therefore portable. Land suddently has this property? Your cost of land storage is perhaps expressed in property taxes.
The share in the properties is now just as fungible as the gold, even though the properties that back the share are not fungible.
That doesn't work. How do you handle redemption? If everyone wishes to redeem their e-land at the same time, some are going to get better land than others.
now non-radioactive land has become more scarce.
That is a spurious argument. It assumes that supply is the only side of the equation. What of demand? A bunch of people have been made radioactive, too. Demand is down. People who have not been killed by the terror-nuke are now hunkering down. They would be less interested in speculating on a bunch of land. Land which is not mountainous would plummet in value on the theory that less radioactivity will get to the high mountain valleys or into the deep shaft mines.
Moreover, you assume that land cannot be manufactured. Sea Structures Inc. disagrees. You assume that land on other planets or in free-orbiting space colonies won't create additional supply. Japan has built an entire airport on land that it reclaimed from the sea. Your own name suggests a "Pays Bas" origin - the Dutch have reclaimed land from the sea for centuries. North Sea oil platforms are created land. Residensea is land in motion.
So, it becomes just a question of having a sufficiently diversifed portfolio of properties in order to neutralise the 'location problem'
Again, this solution works right up until people want to redeem their e-land for land.
John Law tried the same trick with his fiat paper money based on the land in the Mississipi valley. The result was disaster. His "Banque Royale" was the only official source of money. Unfortunately, redeeming the paper for its underlying asset proved to be impossible. A set of "realizers" including the famous French mathematician Lagrange began to unload their currency for anything of value. Lagrange himself, finding nothing more suitable, bought an entire edition of the new dictionary by Bayles. When the money was worthless, millions suffered.
To the everlasting shame of the French, they were not willing to learn their lesson. In 1792, the new National Assembly proclaimed a paper assignat backed again by land. In this case, it was land seized from the Catholic church, land right there in France. Again, the temptations of inflation were too great, and the redemption feature was completely lacking. Fiat money inflation destroyed the French economy, leading to the success of Napoleon who, although he had many deficits, was committed to gold and silver specie for all payments.
In a sort of historical irony, Napoleon sold the land of the Mississippi Valley which had been the underlying asset behind the John Law money to the United States. I think the USA paid 3 cents per acre, and paid in gold. That was back when three cents was worth something.
If you have 1 gram of gold in your e-gold account, you cannot redeem it either.
That's true of e-gold, certainly. With an ounce of gold in my e-Bullion account, I can gain redemption.
Gram bars of gold exist, though they carry a terrible premium to spot.
Which is another argument in favor of e-land.
Not entirely. Not since you seem to be following the examples of John Law's Banque Royale and the National Assembly's assignat into the realm of non-redemption.
Cutting up a 400oz bar is not practical either.
It is a lot more practical than cutting up or subdividing land. When I've divided 400 ounces of gold into 400 one-ounce pieces, each of them is still gold, each of them is as valuable as any other. If I divide a 400 ounce bar into some 12,000 plus grams of gold, each gram is as valuable as any other. With melting and re-casting, I can do it with little waste, and the waste melt or gold shot left over is still gold, has the same properties, and can be recovered. So, fungibility and divisibility remain useful properties of gold, and aren't useful properties of land.
But because larger pieces of land can be more valuable, e-land has the possibility of increasing the average value of its holdings by buying neighbouring pieces.
Not always. What happens if that land next door is not for sale? Now your e-land participants are increasing the value of the land of non-participants.
With gold, the average value of the gold does not increase with buying more bars.
Hmm? How's that again? Of course, buying more bars, and not selling them, is beneficial to the price of gold. E-gold participants do a minor bit to increase the value of gold of non-participants.
As long as not everyone agrees that land is better than gold, I can go on buying land at cheaper prices.
So much for the scarcity theory.
I am too lazy.
I won't argue the point.
It will not be long until you can pay with stocks, just like you pay with currency or gold today.
"Can" is not in question. It can be done now. It just doesn't happen very often. It is not a regular application for stocks.
Hmm, desert land may become wonderfully productive once solar energy becomes a viable alternative for oil.
Well, as long as you are prepared to wait until we see the devil on ice skates....
Desert land may be wonderfully productive if it has oil under it. Much desert land does.
It will be a problem to rent out gold that you are using as backing for an e-currency.
It would also be a problem to rent out land that you are using as backing for an e-currency. Yet, you propose to have farmers or ranchers produce with the land that is supposed to be available for redeeming e-land.
Round the clock markets (electronic trading platforms), where all these stocks and bonds can be traded instantly, make them as useable a 'currency' as gold or dollars.
Lew Rockwell made a great point not that long ago. He asked me to show him where he could use gold in a grocery store. Or e-gold. Then he'd be a believer.
Show me where I can use stocks or bonds in a grocery store. Then I'll be a believer.
Just like there is no 'winner' coming out of the stock market.
There are certainly winners in the stock market. Some currencies will make it, some won't. Some will be very profitable, others will be minimally profitable.
Having all your eggs in one basket (one e-currency) puts you at the risk of loosing everything if that currency goes belly-up
That risk of loss is why the high reputation of gold matters most. People have used and accepted gold as money for thousands of years, probably as long as ten thousand years judging by grave goods. Where we find actual gold on hand, and actual redemption possible, we find currencies which last for years.
E-gold has been around since 1996. I don't see it failing any time soon. GoldMoney and e-Bullion have both been around since 2001, and seem stronger than ever. Pecunix has been around since 2002, I think, and seems to be doing quite well.
Currencies which have failed, such as OSGold, only pretended to have gold. I expect more such fake gold currencies to fail in the future.
Regards,
Jim http://www.ezez.com/
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