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Bitcoin Donations To US Campaigns Might Soon Be Allowed
SonicSpike writes with this excerpt from Politico: "Political campaigns will be allowed to accept — but not spend — the digital currency Bitcoin, under a proposed federal rule released Thursday. The Federal Election Commission draft would require campaigns to first convert any Bitcoins collected as donation to dollars. According to the proposal, the currency will count as an 'in-kind' contribution to a campaign — like a stock or bond. The FEC will not consider them currency. Campaigns are permitted to accept non-monetary contributions like stocks, private stocks, commodities, and equipment— but must list their value in dollars on campaign finance reports. Attorneys for Conservative Action Fund PAC asked the agency in September to decide if and how political candidates and outside groups are allowed to use the digital currency, in addition to U.S. dollars. "
Good. But still bad. Great for Bitcoins. A big shame that donations are allowed at all.
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Congress will take bribes from anyone.
This decision is pretty much, "It isn't real money, but something that enough chumps value."
The US dollar isn't real money either, and it hasn't been since the FDR regime.
With 3D printers you'll be able to make hours, days or any other unit of time at home, for free!
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
They'll probably just get zombies to float it into $20 and under anonymous donations, much like the last two national elections.
Dead People Have Donated Nearly $600K to Campaigns Since 2009
Anonymous Donations Can Remain Secret Despite IRS Requirement to Disclose
Sorry to bear it to you, but your precious US dollar is not real money since 1934 when the US government defaulted. Any form of currency that can be devalued on a whim is make-believe: it lasts only as long as people believe in their government and banking system, and people are rapidly losing faith. Take a look at the public debt to GBP ratios: the debt spiral looks like there will be a collapse in no more than 10-20 years.
That's why people are so desperately looking at a currency that can't be spent at a deficit.
The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
Care to share your definition of "real money"? Money can only be something that people value above its production cost, which makes the existence of "real money" impossible.
PlusFive Slashdot reader for Android. Can post comments.
Sure: real money is any token which can be used to pay for all debts and nearly everything available on general sale. It is supported by systems to ensure it maintains a fairly stable value.
That's one simple, practical definition of money.
Real money is something that has a guarantee that it can be turned into goods or services in the future, backed by something that most people will trust. Examples of the guarantee include a bank that owns a lot of assets making a promise, a guarantee that a government will accept it in payment for taxes or will enforce your right to settle debts with it, or some commodity (historical examples include grain and precious metals) that is stored somewhere in an amount that makes a convincing argument that people who want the commodity can go to the backer and exchange their tokens for the commodity.
Bitcoin is backed by nothing. There is no large organisation (government or private) guaranteeing that they will accept it in exchange for goods, services, or relief from debt. There is no commodity store that you can go to and exchange bitcoins for some guaranteed amount of the commodity.
There are markets, but they are unlike traditional commodity markets because commodity markets have a mixture of traders (who either produce or consume the commodity being traded) and speculators (who bet that the value of the commodity will go up or down and make money when they guess right, and who provide extra liquidity that helps the market function). Bitcoin markets solely contain speculators and so are extremely volatile.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
That would be nice indeed. We've had a wall of Bitcoin stories here over the past few weeks and all too many of them are ifs buts and maybes rather than news.
I guess its because there's a evangelical editor here excited by the market rate (which has been going parabolic even plotted on a log scale).
If I go to a general store, I can't pay with US dollars. Are they not real money?
PlusFive Slashdot reader for Android. Can post comments.
Excellently summarised.
You look bitter. Given your Slashdot ID, I guess you were here in 2010 and you dismissed Bitcoin when you first heard about it. Now you realize that you would be retired if you had bought some then, at 0.05$/bitcoin.
"something that enough chumps value"
sooo..., like USD, or gold.
Is it, "What would be the response of a smartass who doesn't live in the US?"
Yeah, everyone who fails to make bank off a scam is just bitter.
Boiler Room is also a good film.
Love reading the comments of nerds that missed the Bitcoin boat years ago.
Universal acceptance is one of the requirements. If a token is only useful for enumerating some exchange but not others, than it's indistinguishable from grocery store coupons.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
with the likes of those who operate the silk road. "in-kind" contribution? Sounds about right to me.
"My definition" does not matter and neither does yours. Look up a dictionary or ask an expert.
Doesn't Bitcoin allow for anonymous donations?
When you withdraw a lot of cash from a bank, people (like the Feds: DEA, DHS, IRS) take notice. So you fund Bitcoin overseas and meet with your polician of choice, make a deal and a LOT of Bitcoin appears in his account without a trace.
He then tells everyone that it's a grassroots fund raiser - just like Tea Party or Obama.
Has it only been three years? I was sure this stupid scam had been commented on here for a lot longer than that.
With the huge number of stories these must be hundreds of comments which point out the problems by now. Funny thing is I don't remember seeing a story here about the theft of around a million dollars in bitcoins in Australia this week, I only saw that in the mainstream news. We only seem to see stories about bitcoin on this sight that put it in a positive light submitted by people that undoubtedly stand to profit if the pyramid keeps growing.
But don't you see??? Bitcoins will deliver us from the evil of central banking!
All that has to happen is for everyone to agree to use and control them only in the ways the Bitcoin Founding Fathers claimed to intend.
THE PLAN IS FLAWLESS.
Both currencies are backed by exactly nothing.
If the US government would make guaranties about trading dollars for some amount of goods or service, it would be a guaranty agents inflation. Running a money press without adding goods or services is exactly the opposite.
But there is one big difference: Bitcoin is designed to make limitless money printing impossible, which sounds a whole lot better than a promise from some kind government. In fact, Bitcoin does not depend on any politician, anywhere in the world, which makes it ideal for world-wide trusted payments.
I agree that US dollars are (currently) accepted in more places than Bitcon, but the only reason for that is that US dollars are the main currency used to trade oil. Almost every US war has been about stopping the trading of oil in any other currency.
As soon as oil trading switches to Bitcoin, Bitcoin would become a very stable and well accepted currency, and the US dollar would be a very volatile currency, only used locally in the US.
They could encrypt there wallet, and then loose the password. (but then the remaining Bitcoins would increase in value even more)
Jesus Christ, this is how scientologists really think.
Any government could change the algorithms to give itself the power to create new bitcoins. Sure, you can create a fork of bitcoin, just like people could have created a fork of the US dollar at the ending of the gold standard... but you know what almost everyone chose to continue using?
And if it were really true that all US wars are about the currency used to trade oil, the fuck do you think is going to happen to bitcoins the moment some oil speculator even has an idle daydream about trading in bitcoins?
He's being a smartass, true, but his point still stands. By your definition, any currency stops being "real money" as soon as you travel abroad.
Other than being volatile, the bitcoin is better than the USD in every way. How about that?
Ignoring its tendency to eat humans, the lion makes a much better pet than the chihuahua.
Money is anything that someone else values. Simple as that. As soon as I can exchange some goods or services for something I hold and that is not goods or services itself to be consumed and/or traded further, that something becomes money. Whether that's sheets of paper with funny heads printed on it, some shiny pebbles out of certain metals or whatever else, what matters is whether the one offering the good or service is willing to part with it in exchange for that money.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
This is why I prefer the Euro over the Dollar. It is backed by a "real" economy, but instead of one government behind it that could go bonkers and do something radical, over a dozen governments hold their hands over it and it's very unlikely that they will ever agree on anything, let alone any radical change.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
There are many places in the United States that will not accept your dollars as payment.
Let's just admit that it is all a line drawing game. U.S Dollar is a currency that can be used for almost everything in the United States, and quite a lot of things in the rest of the world. Bitcoin is a currency that can be used for a lot of things in the United States and a lot of things throughout the rest of the world.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
Wow, this may be one of the first bitcoin services I had no intention of ever using right out of the gate. I would feel better about.... paying for a murder directly than funding some asshat to go cause mass murders.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
Volatility is exactly the opposite of what you want in a currency. When you sell something, you want to know that the money that you get in return will have a certain approximate value when you spend it. If there's a small but predictable amount of inflation or deflation, then you can factor that in to the purchase. It's much harder to make rational purchasing decisions if the money in your pocket may be worth 50% more or 50% less tomorrow.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Anybody, including governments can start using a different algorithm, but the resulting "bitcoins" would only work between people that are both using the changed algorithm. Even if they used the same Bitcoin name, it still would be a completely separate currency. So given the choice of two currencies, one running an unlimited money press, which do you think would be more popular?
The last time a country started trading oil in Euro's, the US invaded that country, but nothing happened to the Euro.
Yup, and now they want donations for it too.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
Bitcoin is backed by the agreement of people that use bitcoin that it has a certain value. This value tends to change as more people use bitcoin, as there are only so many of them.
The U.S. Dollar is similarly backed by the agreement of the people that it has a certain value. However, that value may change because an outside authority has the power to print more of such money, thus diluting what your current money is worth. Therefore, the U.S. Dollar is an investment vehicle guaranteed to lose value over time in relation to any fixed commodity.
The government does not "back" the dollar at all. If you give them a dollar, they will give you nothing in return, but another dollar.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
I'm pretty sure US businesses and governments still accept the US dollar even if you're abroad.
Universal acceptance is one of the requirements. If a token is only useful for enumerating some exchange but not others, than it's indistinguishable from grocery store coupons.
So we are in agreement that there is no such thing as a currency.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
Exactly. At which point as long as an exchange exists to translate your "money" into "local currency accepted by the local government" anything is currency.
Mod parent up.
Money in generally defined as
medium of exchange
store of value
unit of account.
As such it kind of passes the first test, but volatility kills bitcoin use for the other 2 requirements.
Unless it's backed by something physical, it's still worthless.
And there are definitely people who value bitcoins.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Every definitions exercise is a line-drawing game, lol.
The important property here is that you can buy nearly everything on general sale with US dollars. You can't buy everything with US dollars everywhere, but that's not what matters.
Well, given that everyone continued using the US dollar at the ending of the gold standard, my bet will be that people are going to go for the currency that receives the support of the government they've elected.
Nope.
Try paining at mcdonalds with dollars in europe, or at an apple store for that matter.
Though the _most_common_ money in most countries is the local currency, I've been to four countries and never had any problem spending US dollars in any of them, including at supermarkets restaurants, and bars In one non-US country, sellers saw that I looked like an American and quoted prices in USD. I surprised one shop keeper when I paid in local currency. I had acquired a small amount of local currency but found out there was no need for it.
With 3D printers you'll be able to make hours, days or any other unit of time at home, for free!
I'm sorry to burst your bubble, but you need a 4D printer for that.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
So you posit that bitcoin is both a scam and a pyramid scheme. Very well.
If it is a scam, it must have victims. Please point out the victims of this scam.
If it is a pyramid scheme, then money is being taken from people who entered into the scheme late and being given to the people who entered into the scheme early. Please indicate who has recently had money taken from them to enter into this scheme, and who has been paid for entering into this scheme early.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
USD is probably not the best example, because a lot of foreign stores do accept it. The point is that you can buy nearly everything by type in USD, not everything by quantity in USD.
I find it very interesting that this news comes after the FBI shut down Silk Road, and obtained a rather large wallet. Anyone hear any news of that wallet being decrypted? If not, anyone know who's working on it? In any case, I'll be watching to see who ends up with a rather large amount of bitcoin donations...
There are many places in the United States that will not accept your dollars as payment.
That's an interesting claim. Care to back it up? See, the laws says that the US dollar shall be payment for all debts. To refuse dollars as payment means either declining payment for the debt or commiting a federal felony.
A big shame that politicians are allowed at all. (FTFY)
We live in a world where we can participate in practically any kind of decision-making... except for our own governance.
When you're ready to start fixing the source of the problem, come join the Metagov project in working on collaborative governance.
Backing is required for fiat currencies because they do not have any sort of built in scarcity other than what is enforced by the owner of the fiat. The promise is really to bust down my door with guns if I try to produce any US$ myself, thus creating an artificial scarcity of valuable pieces of basic paper and ink.
Bitcoin is not a fiat currency, it's closer to gold in that it has an actual scarcity, just like one day we'll run out of gold one day we'll run out of bitcoins and our option for expanding the supply will boil down to further subdividing the pool that remains. The backing is fundamentally mathematical in nature, just like gold's value as a currency is that it is very difficult to produce for ANYONE, but if I discover a gold mine in my back yard I can produce all the gold I want without worrying that someone will put me in jail for doing so.
The way the united states was weaned off the gold standard was to enforce fiat style rules on gold, treating ownership of gold the same way we treat counterfeiters, as if the act of owning gold was counterfeiting currency. They took the gold and provided fiat currency instead. It was not until the fiat US$ was firmly established that laws on gold ownership were relaxed.
bend like the reed
Backing is required for fiat currencies because they do not have any sort of built in scarcity other than what is enforced by the owner of the fiat.
Precious metal-based currencies are also backed by the promise that the person storing the metal for you will exchange the currency for some quantity of the metal.
Bitcoin is not a fiat currency, it's closer to gold in that it has an actual scarcity, just like one day we'll run out of gold one day we'll run out of bitcoins and our option for expanding the supply will boil down to further subdividing the pool that remains
Scarcity does not imply value. There are lots of things that are scarce, but have low value because no one wants them. You don't create value just because you have something that is scarce. Pieces of paper on which I have drawn a picture of a cock are scarce, but that doesn't make them valuable. I don't intend to create any more, and so now by your logic they should be more valuable than BitCoins. Want to give me $100 for one?
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Bitcoin is backed by the agreement of people that use bitcoin that it has a certain value. This value tends to change as more people use bitcoin, as there are only so many of them.
That is not backing. Backing requires responsibility. If all of the people who accept bitcoin today suddenly stop tomorrow, who will enforce their guarantee? No one has made legally binding promises to exchange Bitcoins for anything in the future.
The U.S. Dollar is similarly backed by the agreement of the people that it has a certain value. However, that value may change because an outside authority has the power to print more of such money, thus diluting what your current money is worth. Therefore, the U.S. Dollar is an investment vehicle guaranteed to lose value over time in relation to any fixed commodity.
The US Dollar is backed by two guarantees in US law, deriving from Constitution. One is that the US Government will accept them in payment for taxes. The other is that the US Government will, via its legal apparatus, allow any debts held between US citizens to be settled by US Dollars.
This is what gives the US Dollar its value. A large organisation (a government, with a big military) promises to accept them as payment. They can print more, but the rate at which they can do this is limited because they need to maintain the value of new treasury bonds. Since 1960, the rate of inflation of US Dollars has mostly stayed in the 3-5% range (two big peaks over 10%, in the mid '70s and early '80s) and so someone accepting US dollars can be fairly confident that if they spend them again in a few weeks they'll have approximately the same value and even if they keep them for a year or two without investing them they won't lose much.
In contrast, bitcoins can gain or lose 50% of their value overnight. This makes them irrelevant as a currency. How do I price my goods or services in bitcoins when the value is totally unpredictable? It's popular among speculators, because they can make a lot of money if they make good guesses, and the increasing number of speculators keeps driving the price up. If a better game comes out, the value of bitcoins will plummet. And the lower limit on their value is 0, because there is nothing backing them.
The government does not "back" the dollar at all. If you give them a dollar, they will give you nothing in return, but another dollar.
You appear not to understand the concept of backing a currency.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
The victims are the people who are left with worthless bitcoins when the price crashes.
The people who have money taken from them are the ones who buy into bitcoins.
The people who make money are the ones who cash out by selling their bitcoins before they crash.
It is a textbook Ponzi scheme except for the lack of a central distributor.
How hard is it to see that a scam is going on when people are making hundreds of thousands of dollars in paper gains from doing absolutely nothing? No work, no production, no investment. Just buy a bitcoin for $5 today and sell it for $10 tomorrow.
It's a painfully obvious money-for-nothing scheme, as evidenced by the fact that people are getting money for nothing.
Even counting drugs, the minuscule economic activity going on won't even cover the (ridiculous) cost of running the network, never mind the $3,500,000 and rising that some guy is allegedly owed for delivering a pizza once.
Bitcoin is backed by the stakeholders - those who have invested money into mining and bitcoins. These people are citizens of a variety of countries, many of which offer legal rights for investments. The United States, being the very capitalist nation that it is, has many laws that protect its citizen's property. These citizens will be petitioning the government constantly through every legal avenue possible to insure their bitcoin holdings are not made illegal on a political whim. In Canada for example, the Canada Revenue Agency (Canadian IRS) are going to be passing out rules for reporting the income. It's capital gains once sold on the market, and in Canada that tax rate is quite high, however it is a legal avenue to cash out bitcoins.
There is an emerging marketplace for bitcoins, Baidu probably being the largest name to enter this market at the moment. This list may seem trivial now, but there is enough momentum now that it will likely take off. All it needs is the blessing of a major US political party - and to do that just keep sending them BTC donations. They aren't going to make their own hoard of money illegal.
Bitcoin is backed by the agreement of people that use bitcoin that it has a certain value. This value tends to change as more people use bitcoin, as there are only so many of them.
The U.S. Dollar is similarly backed by the agreement of the people that it has a certain value. However, that value may change because an outside authority has the power to print more of such money
SCARCITY != VALUE
Say it with me: SCARCITY != VALUE
Yes, scarcity can be a component of value, but it is not a guarantee. I can go out into my back yard and start picking up random worthless rocks, build a little stand and try to sell them: "Genuine rocks from AthanasiusKircher's back yard! Only a few like them in the world!" Nobody will care.
I could even argue that "This rock is the ONLY ROCK WITH THIS EXACT SHAPE IN THE KNOWN UNIVERSE!!" That's probably true. If it looks pretty, maybe somebody would pay a $1 for it at some flea market. Otherwise, nobody cares about that fact that this rock is "one of a kind."
Spend some time watching those random shows that go looking for antiques, and you'll understand this. There are a lot of rare things in the world, and you'll often get somebody who's willing to pay something for an item that is sufficiently rare. But whether that person will pay $1, or $100, or $10,000 is really up to whether (1) that person really wants the thing that badly for a person collection, or (and much more likely) (2) that person is aware that there is a group of other people out there who would pay at least that much.
You remind me of a friend who said that I should go in with him and invest in case of some kind of scotch (liquor) that was a couple hundred dollars per bottle. It was very rare and rather old, so it's pretty unlikely that anyone would come out with a new giant stockpile somewhere. My friend was convinced that these bottles would only go up in value, and in a decade or two, we could sell them for many times what we bought them for.
Now, what my friend said could happen. There are rare old bottles of scotch that have sold for thousands of dollars. On the other hand, there are also rare old bottles of scotch that aren't worth much more than they were when they were first sold. It all depends on the whims of a very small group of collectors and rich drinkers.
What you say could happen too: Bitcoin's "value tends to change as more people use bitcoin, as there are only so many of them."
But right now the price of Bitcoins is being driven by speculators -- people who are all betting the same thing. It is therefore very volatile. Whether "more people" will gradually adopt it in more circumstances is based on a lot of factors. But even if people start to like the idea of Bitcoin, perhaps someone else will come up with some sort of "virtual currency" that has attributes and advantages which Bitcoin doesn't, and maybe everyone will flock to that instead.
There are items that more-or-less have inherent utility value (like food), and there are others that only have value built on convention (like most currencies). Bitcoin's scarcity will only help it have value IF enough people actually want it.
The government does not "back" the dollar at all. If you give them a dollar, they will give you nothing in return, but another dollar.
Well, the dollar does have one thing going for it that Bitcoin doesn't (and likely never will): the U.S. government requires payment of taxes in dollars. It therefore forces people to use that currency. If people need to pay taxes in dollars, they are likely to receive wages in dollars, and if people receive wages in dollars, they are likely to want to spend them elsewhere.
As long as the government can throw you in jail for failing to pay your taxes using their chosen currency, you'll be forced to use that currency. And if people are forced to use tha
I don't think those people had a option to choose anything else.
Note that gold is valuable because it's rare, and expected to remain rare, not because it's a particularly useful metal in any significant quantities, not unlike Bitcoins.
Disclaimer: I don't have any Bitcoins (yet), I'm just observing that Bitcoins are a lot more "real" than many other currencies. I also expect Bitcoins to be eventually replaced by some other currency, but only if it has similar properties, and some additional advantages over Bitcoins.
Tough to tell what side of the line is any good anymore. In retrospect I'm surprised politicians didn't see this opportunity coming and have laws already in place for any possibility of being bought long before the one person one vote theater happens in the election process.
And you will be held to that bet, maybe it will work out. I hope so.
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Only if we are in disagreement on what it means to be in agreement.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Let's just save some money and do this right for a change.
First; gather all political donations to ALL candidates regardless of party. In fact,this includes every party right down to the independents only registered in one state.
Then; organize a 50 states in 50 days tour like Lollapalooza. ( If George Thorogood can do it, someone wanting to be president can do it.)
Make them all ride in the same bus, no consulting with campaign managers who will be left behind, along with cell phones.
All day debates on 5 stages. Everyone is given a chance on a level playing field to show their stuff for the voters with no bullshit drama to distract from the naked( so to speak) candidates.Then finally at the end have an all week television debate on network t.v. for those not disposed to crowds. Any remaining money could be spread across charities.
THIS is the way the voters need to see candidates. Naked, without a net, without aid, talking about what they would do and why, without any interference from "image" protectors or speech writers. Who the fuck cares what a campaign manager tells a candidate to say? The campaign manager is sitting home rich, while his candidate ruins the country. Time for change. Be smart about it this time.
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
The government is sitting on millions of dollars of Bitcoin seized successfully from the Dread Pirate Roberts' Silk Road shutdown. What a perfect way to put this money back in circulation; political manipulation!
bend like the reed
> To refuse dollars as payment means either declining payment for the debt or commiting a federal felony.
I've heard this claim made before, but I have yet to find anyone who can point to the statute that makes it a "federal felony" not to accept cash... or specify what the punishment is. Care to enlighten us?
Election funds are a money pit.
I can think of no better way to drain the value of bitcoins
and line the pockets of elected officials brothers in law.
Most corruption is the vast media funds where art and air
time are purchased through family shills.
Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't. Mark Twain.
Someone please mod the above AC up. It is a very good answer.
I've only been to neighboring countries - Canada, Mexico, and Jamaica. I'm not sure why I said four. Am I forgetting a country that I've been to? Was I counting the People's Republic of California? shrug
I've been told US dollars are ubiquitous in Singapore. I'm curious. My thought is that in most industrialized countries one could spend USD, maybe at a crappy exchange rate. I wonder if that's true.
I could have screwed that hot, drunk fifteen year old girl too, but chose not to take advantage just like I chose not to take advantage of later adopting suckers buying into the bitcoin pyramid.
It's a scam. There's plenty of comments here that describe why far better than I can put it.
I hate to point out the obvious but the money you call real today is no more real than bit coins. In fact it is quite matter of factly 'bit' coins, existing purely in electronic ether, as a convention, whose value is assessed purely based on expectations, estimates, or guesses, confidence or lack there of, individual or corporate bravado, and economic and political manipulation/intimidation.
I don't see why we should be afraid or inconvenienced with another convention. Especially one which exists, at least seemingly for now, outside of the current world-wide system.
Bubble? It's a hyperbubble, you insensitive clod!
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I'm sure the politicians in our current Dollarocracy will find a quasi-legal way of shuffling these funds into their private slush funds (Can you say Tahiti vacation!). If we don't find a way of getting big money out of our elections soon, the billionaires and corporations will soon be in total charge of our government. I'm sure they would think replacing food stamps with Solient Green is perfectly acceptable for their bottom lines!
My karma is bad. Don't get too close!!!
Yet another way to launder botcoins.
Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company -- Mark Twain
Actually, the law (in the US) says that the US Dollar is payment for all debts. That doesn't apply if there is no debt. If I order a meal in a restaurant, and I owe $20, that's a debt, and they have to accept a twenty-dollar bill as payment. If I want to buy a $20 book in a bookstore, there is no existing debt and therefore the payment law does not apply. To put it another way, they have no legal obligation to sell the book to me (not entirely true, but probably close enough), so they can put conditions on the sale. Some places do not want to accept bills over $20, for example, so they will refuse to sell me $100 of merchandise for a $100 bill.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
> If I order a meal in a restaurant, and I owe $20, that's a debt, and they have to accept a twenty-dollar bill as payment.
No, they don't, actually. They can refuse payment in cash - but since cash is legal tender, they can't then claim that you refused to pay. You have made a "legal and valid" offer of payment.
"There is, however, no Federal statute mandating that a private business, a person or an organization must accept currency or coins as for payment for goods and/or services."