Hey Steemit fam,
I mentioned in my introductory post that I am a social worker in New Orleans. More specifically, I work in an apartment building. It is an animated building – I’ll try not to digress too much, but to tell this story, it’s necessary to share some characteristics of the tenant population. They have all experienced homelessness. Median age range 45-60. Mental illness is prevalent. Chronic substance abuse problems are common. Literacy problems are common. Computer literacy is very uncommon. Many have no income at all and are housed via voucher, and the most anyone can make (on the books) without exceeding the income limit is something like $22k.
Recently, a woman moved in and when I was doing her intake, she mentioned that she wanted to buy a pack of cigarettes, but only had digital currency. I thought she misspoke.
“You mean like a gift card?” I asked.
“No, bitcoin,” she says.
She showed me her government phone with her mycelium wallet. “There is a bitcoin ATM at the Brown Derby store…” The Brown Derby is a convenient store a few blocks away. She was told by her friend that it was a good investment, so decided to buy some. Her friend helped her set up the wallet.
We have a community group every Friday where we make coffee and see where the conversation goes. Last Friday I brought up bitcoin and we spoke about it for a half hour. One resident offered up the prevalent opinion of “it’s not real money” Soon afterwards we established that the U.S. Dollar could be said to be, “just a piece of paper.”
It turns out that 5 of the 15 residents present claimed to have used the Bitcoin ATM, but only one still held any. Another government phone, another mycelium wallet. The other 4 claim that they were either not interested in holding it long term, or could not grasp it conceptually and gave up. Keep in mind that the same stores where these bitcoin ATM’s are popping up are the same places that constantly sell lottery tickets. But at any rate, I am floored by bitcoin’s growing popularity, accessibility and ownership, if only because I know how bad those government phones are.
(Disclaimer: If at any time, I sounded rude when describing the population I work with, it’s not deliberate. They’ve been through hell and back.)
Thanks for reading!