Crypto Critic Krugman Gets a Fiat Reality Check
The latest Twitter storm saw renewed tensions between Nobel-winning economist Paul Krugman and the crypto community.
American economist Paul Krugman who won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2008 had a rough week.
On March 8 Krugman tweeted that he had been using the Venmo mobile payment service for years. Yet, it suddenly stopped him from making payments. “I spent a long time in chat with representatives, and they told me that they could not explain why – or fix it. The software has taken control.”
Source: Krugman’s Twitter
In the crypto community, Krugman's tweet did not go unnoticed - especially given Krugman's previous unflattering statements about cryptocurrency.
In 2018, he claimed that cryptocurrencies don’t really have additional value as bank accounts, debit cards, Paypal, and Venmo offer electronic transactions too. He also alluded to the illicit use of crypto. In a lengthy thread, he also added that Bitcoin is worthless.
Source: Krugman’s Twitter
Source: Krugman’s Twitter
Prominent crypto advocates such as Michael Saylor were quick to react to Krugman’s “vent”, pointing out that “Bitcoin fixes this.”
Source: Krugman’s Twitter
Others took a more sarcastic approach. Neeraj K. Agrawal of the Coin Center think tank mockingly asked Krugman if he was trying to buy drugs or commit murder with his Venmo account. And Adam Singer of AdQuick pointed out that this was the first in a series of tweets that would lead to Krugman becoming a Bitcoin maximalist.
Source: Krugman’s Twitter
Another tweet of this kind includes a joke from Samson Mow, the CEO of JAN3com, who suggested that Paul Krugman is a Luddite since he is most probably chatting with Venmo by fax and that “must be tedious.”
Source: Krugman’s Twitter
Krugman chose not to engage with the crypto community. He also later added that he was able to resolve the issue with Venmo thanks to his Twitter “vent”. It remains unknown whether this story will incentivize him to explore cryptocurrencies and their use cases in much more detail.
Previously, Gagarin News reported that Nouriel Roubini, an economist famous for predicting the 2008 financial meltdown and an avid critic of the crypto-verse, had decided to join the token industry.
Tw: All of us have rough days once in a while. Nobel laureate and avid #crypto critic @paulkrugman is no exception. The crypto community mocked him for his latest tweet, with some like @Excellion suggesting that resolving #fiat-related issues by fax “must be tedious.”
