Tuesday I was lucky enough to participate in "The Merge" Congressional Staff Briefing. This briefing was hosted by the Congressional Blockchain Caucus a bipartisan group of lawmakers who are pro-crypto and blockchain. For the most part, these members only want to pass legislation to is minimal in nature and does not deeply affect the industry. I was sent the invitation to this briefing late last week and to be honest I was not sure I would be able to attend because... I have a major water leak in my apartment but boy was I happy that I did.
First and foremost this covered only Ethereum and The Merge no other cryptos were discussed or even mentioned. As you would expect this dealt with not only where Ethereum currently has been but also where it will become tomorrow afternoon! For this event, we had two fantastic presenters the most important one being Ben Edgington who has been involved with moving PoW Eth to PoS Eth and has dedicated years to this cause. In this briefing, we got a rundown of the various legal challenges that will face PoS Eth as well as some of the underlying fundamentals like blocks will have a schedule now of 12 seconds.
The legal issues faced are ones that currently other PoS cryptos face in the way that the government handles income from staking. To make the issue at hand easier to understand an analogy was used to compare the current tax policy to a farmer. Tax policy currently treats PoS as if the government taxed a farmer as soon as he harvested his crops and then again when he sold them. This is a clear issue that as soon as the merge happens the government will be pressured into addressing and thus really peeling back and looking at the whole can of worms.
At the end of the briefing presentation, I was extremely impressed by the questions various staffers from both the House and the Senate, Personal Offices, and Committee's asked. Various people were able to ask incredibly detailed questions and things like the sanctioning of Tornado Cash were also talked about and how current U.S. law fails to address both the blockchain industry but also how something like Tornado Cash could be sanctioned. With the questions asked I am more optimistic than beforehand that some sort of agreement might be possible before the end of the year!
While nothing is guaranteed and the government itself runs out of funding at the end of the month unless they pass either a budget or a continuing resolution this served as an eye opener for me. It was so encouraging to see people that cared and also that came from all types of backgrounds. Sure there were some pretty basic level questions asked that people who are beginners would not know but they were all answered and addressed!
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