Poverty in the World and Crypto Adoption: What If We Crossed the Two?

First food, then morals. Brecht spoke of hunger, not blockchain, but the idea holds. The grand theories about who adopts Bitcoin often collapse when confronted with the numbers. The Census Bureau released its annual report on poverty in the United States this week, a statement that seemingly concerns no one at JDC. However, upon digging deeper, the question becomes significantly more interesting: intuition would suggest that crypto is adopted first where money is lacking, as a refuge for the poorest. Yet, the United States, the richest country in the world where poverty is declining, ranks second in the global crypto adoption list. Conversely, in South America, it is not the poorest who are adopting en masse, but those watching their national currency go up in smoke: in Argentina, it is stablecoins, not poverty, that do the heavy lifting. So, does crypto adoption really progress where poverty progresses? The answer is no, and that is precisely what makes it useful. Key points of this article:

• The Census Bureau reported a record median income in the United States for 2025, showing a decline in poverty.

• Despite an increase in poverty in France, the adoption of crypto assets remains lower than in countries less affected by poverty.