Discussion Paper Details

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Full Details

Title: More (or Less) Economic Limits of the Blockchain

Author(s): Neil Gandal and Joshua Gans

Publication Date: November 2019

Keyword(s): blockchain, proof-of-stake and Proof-of-Work

Programme Area(s): Industrial Organization

Abstract: This paper extends the blockchain sustainability framework of Budish (2018) to consider proof of stake (in addition to proof of work) consensus mechanisms and permissioned (where the number of nodes are fixed) networks. It is demonstrated that an economically sustainable network will involve the same cost regardless of whether it is proof of work or proof of stake although in the later the cost will take the form of illiquid financial resources. In addition, it is shown that regulating the number of nodes (as in a permissioned network) does not lead to additional cost savings that cannot otherwise be achieved via a setting of block rewards in a permissionless (i.e., free entry) network. This suggests that permissioned networks will not be able to economize on costs relative to permissionless networks.

For full details and related downloads, please visit: https://cepr.org/active/publications/discussion_papers/dp.php?dpno=14154

Bibliographic Reference

Gandal, N and Gans, J. 2019. 'More (or Less) Economic Limits of the Blockchain'. London, Centre for Economic Policy Research. https://cepr.org/active/publications/discussion_papers/dp.php?dpno=14154