There is a huge difference between rich and poor. What is the distribution of Bitcoin wealth?

Bitcoin was born in the economic crisis more than a decade ago. People feel that this system is more fair and just than the traditional financial system. However, the current distribution of Bitcoin shows that the gap between rich and poor in Bitcoin is even larger than in the real world.

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(Image source: Pixabay )

Bitcoin cannot solve inequality of wealth distribution

There has been huge controversy over the distribution of Bitcoin's wealth. Although this cryptocurrency was born against the background of the financial crisis caused by greedy, "too big to fail" banks, it eventually ended up with the inequality of wealth distribution like the traditional financial world.

In the first few years of Bitcoin's development, the distribution of Bitcoin's wealth was mainly influenced by miners. Therefore, those who hold the most bitcoin are those who have certain knowledge and ability to obtain bitcoin through mining. At the time, because people didn't know much about Bitcoin, a man accidentally threw a hard drive containing 7,500 Bitcoin private keys.

However, as cryptocurrencies become more popular, Bitcoin's audience has changed from geeks to investors. The door to Bitcoin is gradually opening to the rich. High net worth individuals and institutional investors have begun to take control of the cryptocurrency market and shift inequality of wealth to Bitcoin. This situation will never change, because the blockchain is decentralized, and it operates differently from the communist model where everyone is equal.

Bitcoin wealth distribution compared to U.S. wealth distribution

Let's see how the distribution of Bitcoin's wealth differs from the distribution of wealth in the United States. We will use BitInfoCharts to measure Bitcoin data, as well as a statistical chart of US wealth inequality in 2016. The following is the wealth gap in the United States:

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U.S. Wealth Distribution in 2016

These highlighted sections can help you better compare the distribution of Bitcoin between different addresses.

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Bitcoin holdings distribution

Although the charts are representative, there are two things you need to consider:

  1. Statistical charts of US wealth distribution show annual income rather than net worth;
  2. Bitcoin wealth map shows addresses instead of holders;

However, the inequality of bitcoin's wealth distribution is indeed more serious, because with the limited supply of bitcoin, rich investors can afford more bitcoin.

Bitcoin wealth distribution compared to global wealth distribution

We can also compare Bitcoin's wealth distribution to the global wealth inequality pyramid based on data from Credit Suisse in 2018.

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Comparison of Bitcoin Wealth Distribution and Global Wealth Distribution

As you can see, according to the above chart data, the proportion of Bitcoin addresses with less than $ 10,000 is much larger than the proportion of global wealth with less than $ 10,000.

Similarly, this comparison has a big flaw, that is, one person can have multiple Bitcoin addresses, but it can still show the degree of difference in wealth distribution to a certain extent.

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