I mean, the VACCINES ARE BAD folks do have some "different" arguments in that some think it's 5G trackers, some think it's mind control, some think it's sterility, some thing it's making you autistic or trans....some have combinations of more than one of these. Those are "different" but they're all nonsensically wrong.... and it's all the same common problem between them in failing to have any understanding of the topic or science in general.
Same thing here among the CRYPTO IS MONEY AND FIAT IS BAD folks, but with ignorance of history and economics instead of biology and genetics (and wifi I guess!)
There are some people who seem to have the black and white belief that anything a government does is bad. There is not a government in the world that isn't guilty of doing something that isn't right, but centrally managing a currency is not necessarily one of them. In some instances governments may do things with their currency that aren't great, but just the fact that the government controls the nation's currency is not in itself a bad thing.
One of the problems the world had with currencies that were intrinsically tied to something tangible like gold was the money supply, and hence the capital supply was limited. When currencies were freed from this restriction it also freed up capital to flow into technological and scientific development and the last 80 years has been the fastest pace of technological development the world has ever seen.
Like most things there are dangers to fiat currencies too. Governments that produce new currency faster than the growth of the economy tend to see hyper inflation and a collapse of the economy.
I find it ironic that the party in the US who makes the most noise about how evils of the government and fiat currency is also the party that runs up the deficit the most when its in power. Hypocrisy at its finest.
The Constitution was written at a time when the speed of information was three miles per hour. When nearly everybody in the country lived on a farm. It was written by people who thought it was a good idea for people to own other people and have the right to summarily whip, brand, or kill the people they owned. Some of the framers of the Constitution had human beings burned with red-hot iron for the "crime" of picking cotton slower than their foremen thought they should be capable of.
So, no, I don't regard those barbaric, racist, vile pieces of human garbage as worthwhile authorities for how we should run our monetary system some two and a half centuries later.
And, FWIW, the Constitution has been amended since then.
Those people I mentioned above who think that paper money is worthless and the income tax is illegal, they get those ideas from reading the Constitution WITHOUT its amendments.
There is a group of people in the US who seem to consider the Constitution as some kind of holy document that was passed down from on high and can't be altered in any way or re-interpreted as times change. As you point out the world of the 21st century is vastly different from the world of the 18th when the document was originally written.
People who are against taxes like to point out how low taxes were in the 18th and 19th century. The world was also a much simpler place then. Transportation was partially by rail by the late 19th century, but all other transportation on land was done by animals over mostly dirt roads as a pace little more than a human walking pace.
The state of medicine was very primitive. There is line that the life expectancy was around 40 for Americans in 1900. That is true if you look at expected lifespan from birth, but if you made it past 5 you could expect to live into your 60s. The average lifespan was that short because so many children died in infancy. Very few families had all their children make it to adulthood which was why the birthrate was so high.
By the late 19th century most children were getting at least to 8th grade, but the education system was poor with only a very, very small percentage of the population getting a college education.
In the 18th century the weapons of war were inexpensive. What a soldier carried on the battlefield was little more than what a farmer had to control vermin and do some hunting. That's why the Minutemen of the American Revolution were so effective. Today the weapons of war are vastly more sophisticated than anything someone outside of the military can have or afford. The US allows demilitarized military rifles in private hands (with many having a problem with it, but it is allowed), but that's only the most basic weapon available to the military. Most of what the military uses is not allowed in civilian hands. And that kit is vastly more expensive than anything in the 18th century, even factoring in inflation.
The USS Constitution frigate cost $302,000 in 1797. According to this, that's $7.2 million in 2023 dollars
$302,000 in 1797 → 2023 | Inflation Calculator
Those 7 frigates were the peak of military technology in 1797. One F-35 costs $75 million.
Another thing that came along in the 20th century were social safety nets. Even in the US there is a substantial social safety net for elderly people. All developed countries have tax payer supported social safety nets for those less fortunate.
Those roads, health care, education, social safety nets, and military tech all cost money and therefore the population needs to be taxed more than it did when the world was a more primitive place.
The "government is evil" crowd don't realize all the benefits of government. Most got a government paid education (in full or in part), benefit from government maintained roads, are protected by a government paid military, and benefit from advanced in medicine paid for with government money or may get health care directly from the government. Some are drawing from government paid safety nets too.
Government run currencies are all part of this economy. Private currencies are not going to replace these things, and if we collectively try to, it will likely collapse the economy. There is no place for a privately run currency to replace the government supported currency. Private currencies, if they survive and aren't just a fad, will never replace government currencies and will always be small sub-economies off to the side of the main economy.
