Should Ethereum Tax Its Apps to Prove Its Security Is Worth It?

Jeff Dorman argues that Vitalik Buterin’s push to frame ETH as a store of value is “really misguided” because it assumes Ethereum can win a role that Bitcoin only reached by accident and that most chains will never be able to claim. He says ETH has no rationale to be used outside the Ethereum network itself, and that any store-of-value thesis for ETH would require believing the entire world moves onto blockchain and onto Ethereum specifically.

Dorman is more interested in how a layer 1 can capture value from the activity it enables. He says the cleanest model is Hyperliquid’s “holy trinity”: a chain, a native DEX, and control of stablecoin distribution. In his view, Ethereum should have built its own stablecoin and DEX, rather than letting other businesses extract fees on top of the network.

If Ethereum cannot unwind that structure, Dorman says it should tax applications that run on it. He argues that if ETH security is as valuable as advocates claim, then apps should be willing to pay for it, and the market would reveal whether they stay or migrate to a cheaper chain. He does not give a precise rate, but says it would need to be “a pretty high number.”