While lurking around Reddit, I found a really great sarcastic comment from /u/backofthefridge that said:
Cash out the 401(k) & little Johnny’s college fund, get that third mortgage, pawn grandpa’s coin collection…and remember, you can get by just fine on one kidney.
It made me wonder, “why aren’t there dialysis franchises EATING this up?” Then it made me realize that they haven’t jumped on yet because there hasn’t been a real reason to yet, this same response also likely holds true to the other industries I’ve listed below. This is not an all inclusive list, but it does focus on the 5 LARGE verticals that I feel must adopt Bitcoin in order for us to see future steps towards mainstream adoption occur. Without further adieu lets begin:
1. Easier IO with current Banking Systems
The ability to have a bit-bank that has insurance and pays out interest on deposited bitcoins. It would even be able to offer more lucrative securities such as investment Bit CDs.
Why it matters: there are many different people out in the world. There are different bank types available but there is only Bitpay, Coinbase, and a few others that really easily quickly offer an out for merchants. It would be trivial for the existing companies to either develop software in-house to interact with the bitcoin protocol to provide integrated
2. Health Care Providers | Suppliers
What good is a little medical insurance without the ability to be a benefit. Have you noticed how health care is really more of a cumbersome burden to withhold with insurance involved vs the cost of procedures? How could Obamacare possibly expect me to pay $453 per month for my family when it would cost me a $50 dollar copay for visit, $357 dollars for x-rays and an additional $67 dollars on prescription costs? Why is it so expensive to begin with where other places it is up to 80 reduction in cost or more?
Why it matters: Health care procedures are expensive and are usually required for the health and safety of individual well-being. By allowing users to make payments in BTC, more folks who may hold BTC as an alternative would be interested in utilizing these practices offering healthcare services and goods. It would provide a mechanism for Doctors to accept bitcoin and thus have it to be able to pay medical supplier companies. The reduction in administration fees from using a more frictionless bitcoin system to accept and process payments could allow these different practices to offer cheaper services, making them more competitive and accessible to users who need them.
3. Insurances – like car, life, dental, & health.
Insurance is one of those annoying necessities we love to hate until the time times that we need it. For sure, as a male, during the ages of 18-24, I hated car insurance with a passion for the cost factor associated with monthly premiums. I wasn’t driving very fast nor too often and yet my car insurance cost nearly 200 dollars per month. Looking into the example I gave with healthcare expenses above, its no wonder that we really do not, as a whole, care for insurance.
Why it Matters: Health care systems denominated in bitcoin could allow patients to deposit, say, .2 bitcoin into the health insurance system (around $125 USD when I last checked) to stay there and remain as a portion of coverage as long as that .2 btc increases in value. It has a crutch that if all btc was eventually worthless that they would need to recede back to expensive health care, if btc does take off, then that .2 btc is worth much more as time progressed so that if you deposited that .2 btc at the age of 18 and in 5 years btc is worth 2000 dollars each then you’ve just seen your 125 turn into 400 USD of health care purchasing power – all for simply sitting on bitcoin. Health care systems could charge a small administrative fee.
There could be premium denominated insurances where a user is expected to place .2 BTC in per month for 5 years – that would add up to 10 BTC paid into the insurance fund – it could work such that the money remains on account for the person to use for their procedures or to draw from perhaps. It could survive in such that a small fee of .2% is paid out for administration whenever things need to change or disbursements are made.
4. Larger Business/Vertical Costs
What do these brands have in common? They all pay other companies for raw materials and services. Companies like Mclane Distribution and Aramark – get those juggernauts to ‘accept bitcoin’ and you’ll see more of the above willing to follow.
Why it matters: a way for merchants to transfer value to their vendors without needing to exchange back into local fiat allows new versions of schedules and other possibilities. Imagine net terms involved where there is a variable discount modifier based on market conditions. This could allow a company like, say McDonalds, to pay Lopez foods in BTC and possibly get an additional 2% off (on top of the standard 2% for paying in 10 days vs the net 30) for payment on a current beef order invoice. They got this EXTRA 2% because the market showed an appreciation of value in the gain of 2%+ since payment which allowed Lopez to gain more $$$ per BTC as a result of the payment timing. (Granted, this agreement would need to be offered by Lopez Farms beforehand – and could serve to undermine Lopez potentially if the market were to swing downward or if Lopez were to immediately convert BTC holdings over to fiat.)
5. Paying for Student | Credit | Mortgage Debt
By now you may have the wise idea to spit into the punch with the, “Well, I could just cash out my BTC to cover this and most of the other things you mentioned above like Medical Insurance, Restaurant Bills and more!”, but the fact of the matter is that most debt collection and loan repayment operations have no care as to what BTC is. Though currently BTC is new, because of its nature to act as a near frictionless store of value, there will be more methods to offer direct loan repayment in the form of BTC as Banking IO between BTC matures.
Why it Matters: I am currently in the process of homebuying and right now it has been harder than usual to prove my source of income. I can show funds through the blockchain, but its currently not taken at face value as a source of income. Cashing out my BTC requires that I pay into fees to do so and furthermore, forces me to have to use the traditional bank IO to deposit/withdraw funds to pay my current bills and potentially soon-to-be mortgage. If I could use the blockchain and owned bitcoin addresses (where I could sign a transaction, thus proving ownership) I could use these as a means to show that there are assets available to lend against and repay with. My issue with needing to convert BTC back into Fiat is that I can now no longer hold my “Long” position, that is I must allocate other money to convert back into BTC in order to gain once BTC price increases dramatically.
Thanks for reading. If you enjoyed this article, please consider spreading adoption yourself. You can do so through purchasing this, this, this, or even these.
