I think you are misunderstanding some things :) Let me explain.
Video is not saying 20% interest alone makes a platform ponzi scheme at all. It is talking about cashing out of Tron, which is probably pre-mined or founder coins. Imagine if you are a founder of chain and have massive amounts of those coins. If you wanted to cash out, the price would drop significantly and you wouldn't be able to maximize your profits. But by converting Tron to USDD you can trick others to buy into your scheme, while not affecting the price of the underlying coins, in this case tron. And to make this new coin attractive for people to buy you offer crazy APR like 39%. That is what video is talking about.
You can't do that on Hive, because of how decentralized it is. The richest stakeholder on Hive only has about 3% of total supply. And you don't actually see anybody minting massive amounts of HBD either. If someone did, we would all see it. That's actually is one of the reasons for making these monthly HBD interest payment posts to see what is changing.
We can't tell with certainty the reason why the HBD interest payments dropped in June based on this report. It only collects interest payments. It doesn't consider other transactions like new HBD creation, supply change, moving to and from exchanges, etc. The scope of these reports is very limited and is only intended to keep track of the interest payments. Nothing else. So, we can't say that any dumped or acquired HBD based on this.
Death spiral was referring to what happened to UST/LUNA, and if/when USDD activates its algorithmic pegging it may potentially face the same problems UST/LUNA had. This topic has been discussed a lot last month and it is clear that UST/LUNA didn't have protective measures that HBD has.
the stats show that high interest on HBD interest is a game that benefits the top 1% at a cost to the 99%.
This statement of yours is completely wrong. :)
Everybody who is receiving any HBD interest payments and getting them in proportion to the money they are willing to invest or keep in savings. This is their own personal money. They are the only ones who are taking the risk with this investment. And they will be the ones who get the rewards. This investment mechanism is open to everybody. Anybody can convert their cash or other assets into HBD and take advantage of these returns, and also take the risks that come along. If this was the greatest and easiest thing to do, everybody would do it.
These interest payments are not at the cost of 99% at all. What do you even mean? The cost of these interest payments are paid by Hive stakeholders, just like all the other rewards Hive offers. All rewards on Hive: author rewards, curation rewards, witness rewards, HBD interest, etc come out of Hive inflation which is about 6-7% a year. This inflation dilutes the shares of stakeholders. This means, stakeholders collectively are responsible for all rewards given out by Hive blockchain.
HBD interest payments are very small compared to content rewards. For example, since its start Hive paid out total of 339,059 HBD as interest payments, while have distributed about $20 million USD/HBD worth of content rewards in the year of 2021.
So much for the claim that HIVE will make a positive difference in reducing the inequities of the world.
Nobody makes such claims. lol. or at least this is the first time I see this. Hive does empower ordinary people. It creates opportunities for people to build web, apps, games, and communities in a decentralized manner on a decentralized network.