This can make the 'rate of deflation' that occurs worse:
* https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Deflationary_spiral
* https://isps.yale.edu/news/blog/2014/06/the-perils-of-bitcoi...
* https://crypto.bi/deflationary/
† I am aware of satoshis.
Considering this, while it is true that all this makes deflation worse, I’d assume most bitcoin hodlers would not mind this.
Which can limit economic growth. When money was based the amount of gold available, there were long periods of economic stagnation because of liquidity issues:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Depression
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Bullion_Famine
The stagnation only ended when new sources of shiny rocks were found (California; New World).
I find it a dumb idea what whether or not people can get credit to start/expand businesses would be dependent of solving math problems. Yes, credit creation can be "too easy" and become a problem, but making it "too hard" (or physically/mathematically impossible) is even more dumb.
During the "long depression" GDP was still growing at 3-4% so it was hardly stagnation.
So the finite amount of base money would just mean that derivative products would be used as practical money.
I don't know of many things that are viewed positively that have been given a label with "depression" in it.
> Figures from Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz show net national product increased 3 percent per year from 1869 to 1879 and real national product grew at 6.8 percent per year during that time frame.[32] However, since between 1869 and 1879 the population of the United States increased by over 17.5 percent,[33] per capita NNP growth was lower. Following the end of the episode in 1879, the U.S. economy would remain unstable, experiencing recessions for 114 of the 253 months until January 1901.[34]
> The dramatic shift in prices mauled nominal wages – in the United States, nominal wages declined by one-quarter during the 1870s,[14] and as much as one-half in some places, such as Pennsylvania.[35] Although real wages had enjoyed robust growth in the aftermath of the American Civil War, increasing by nearly a quarter between 1865 and 1873, they stagnated until the 1880s, posting no real growth, before resuming their robust rate of expansion in the later 1880s.[36] The collapse of cotton prices devastated the already war-ravaged economy of the southern United States.[17]
> Thousands of American businesses failed, defaulting on more than a billion dollars of debt.[35] One in four laborers in New York were out of work in the winter of 1873–1874[35] and, nationally, a million became unemployed.[35]
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Depression#United_States
Seems like a grand-ol time.
That’s quite a mischaracterization. We can at least agree that Bitcoin’s supply is set up to increase at a pre-set rate over time. The math problems are the means to enforce that rate. Not the controlling factor.