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In praise of cash

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Re: In praise of cash

#301

Post by rimantas »

coldtea wrote: post #128
afarrell wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People will simply return to barter. In what societies have humans used barter? I suspect we would instead use something like tobacco, laundry detergent, or startup t-shirts as cash or we would keep a mental register of who owes whom a favor.

> In what societies have humans used barter? Almost all of them to some degree. Including modern societies (at rural places), especially up until the sixties or so, and even Western European cities (during the war and the very poor years post war). Also common in communist countries...

How many communist countries have you lived in? Cared to name a couple, where barter was preferred?

Re: In praise of cash

#302

Post by c22 »

ghaff wrote: post #33
angersock wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you never paid for admittance to a club? Paid a busker? Gone shopping at a thrift store or pawn shop? Bought something at a garage sale? Paid for dinner and tipped without having to split the check for n different cards? Your post reeks of inexperience.

I've actually wondered what the impact on buskers, clerks that make some money off a tip jar, etc. is of the shift toward plastic. I guess, in the US, a dollar bill is still a relatively small amount. But I know that I basically never have change on me these days unless it's quarters to put in a parking meter.

I imagine tip jar employees are doing all right. I used to drop a dollar and whatever coins I got back as change in there, now I push the 20% button on their iPad, which is almost always more.

Re: In praise of cash

#303

Post by Symbiote »

coldpie wrote: post #169
oculusthrift wrote: post #158

I've never used cash regularly in my life. I hate carrying extra stuff around, so just have one of those card holders attached to my phone. I feel like older people are ingrained with cash, but it hasn't come into my life at all. College kids these days even use Venmo to buy drugs. Of course I know I'm subjecting myself to tracking which is somewhat scary but I guess the convenience has outweighed that for me.

You're also sending a 3-5% tithe to the payment processor (credit card company, bank, electronic payment provider) with every transaction instead of giving that money directly to the service provider.

There are still costs to handling cash, which will vary in each case based on business size.

Hiring those armoured vans to move it around, loss by theft or error by staff, time spent counting money, making cash deposits or withdrawals from the bank, and perhaps higher insurance.

Whether those costs are more or less than cash presumably varies. A public transport operator seems the obvious case where cash costs are high.

The EU capped fees at 0.2% for debit card transactions, and 0.3% for credit cards. I'd guess that makes them very competitive with cash -- the discount German supermarkets, well-known previously for only accepting cash, started to take cards. It also led to the demise of cashback credit cards, but I'm not sorry to see them go.

http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_MEMO-16-2162_en.htm

Re: In praise of cash

#304

Post by Symbiote »

kalleboo wrote: post #283
otakucode wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And don't forget that 'payment processing' is never free. In fact, it is never even a flat fee despite the fact that it does not actually cost anything more to transfer a larger number over a network than it does a smaller one. Yet people seem to have no problem handing over the majority of their economy to 'processed' payments which empower banks with the ability to do nothing less than levy taxes and exert the same…

> If they wish to restrict the availability of money in the economy, they can simply raise the payment processing fees. If they wish to boost their own profit margin, they simply raise the payment processing fees In Europe, payment processing interchange fees are regulated. Debit cards are fixed at 0.3% and credit cards at 0.2%. SEPA wire payments have zero interchange.

> SEPA wire payments have zero interchange.

That's not exactly true. Payments to other countries within the SEPA must not cost more than a domestic payment. That's usually nothing for people, but businesses may pay.

As an example, the Bank of Ireland charges businesses €0.10

https://businessbanking.bankofireland.com/banking/current-ac...

Re: In praise of cash

#305

Post by kalleboo »

iopq wrote: post #207
cortesoft wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It might make it hard to prove the coins' source, but it would make proving money laundering easier.

Using a tumbler is not against the law. For one thing, you can't launder bitcoins because bitcoins are a commodity, not considered money.

Not today it isn't, but it's not a very far leap for the law to make if it becomes a widespread problem.

Apparently "gold laundering" is a thing in some jurisdictions. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_laundering

Re: In praise of cash

#306

Post by kalleboo »

Symbiote wrote: post #304
kalleboo wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If they wish to restrict the availability of money in the economy, they can simply raise the payment processing fees. If they wish to boost their own profit margin, they simply raise the payment processing fees In Europe, payment processing interchange fees are regulated. Debit cards are fixed at 0.3% and credit cards at 0.2%. SEPA wire payments have zero interchange.

> SEPA wire payments have zero interchange. That's not exactly true. Payments to other countries within the SEPA must not cost more than a domestic payment. That's usually nothing for people, but businesses may pay. As an example, the Bank of Ireland charges businesses €0.10 https://businessbanking.bankofireland.com/banking/current-ac...

Right. Banks can charge their customers whatever they want (as long as it's the same as for domestic transfers), but they can't charge other banks fees for accepting their wire transfers.

So an upstart bank can claim zero fees, still have access to other banks without them ruining it for them. But in the case of debit/credit cards, you couldn't start a card processor without being subject to fees.

Re: In praise of cash

#307

Post by kalleboo »

ghaff wrote: post #120
scrumper wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An electronic payments system-based vending machine is risker (where the risk is to your ability as a consumer to get a coke on demand) than the current model (coin operated vending machine) since it depends on connectivity to the payments network to function. This is easily interrupted through malice, negligence, or oversight. In my experience coin op vending machines by and large work; bill readers are hit and miss…

In Japan, vending machines that take Pasmo and similar smart cards are pretty common. But Japan is pretty much an outlier AFAIK in its extremely widespread use of this type of technology.

Not just in Japan, plenty of countries in Asia have offline stored-value cards that started out as train cards but can be used in many shops [commonly in convenience stores] as well (see Octopus in Hong Kong, ez-link in Singapore, EasyCard in Taiwan, Touch 'n Go in Malaysia, etc)

Re: In praise of cash

#308

Post by kalleboo »

seppin wrote: post #57
sparrish wrote: post #13

After having my card skimmed for the 4th time (at a gas station pump, at checkout at grocery store, etc), I decided to pay for everything with cash. It's not worth the hours it takes to clear up things with the bank and I get a better understanding of where my money is being spent when my wallet gets light.

Only use a card with a chip. Problem solved

When I lived in Europe it was really tempting to just completely scratch off the magstripe, as everyone used the chip. I was never sure if ATMs use the chip or not though.

Re: In praise of cash

#309

Post by pedrocr »

nullc wrote: post #276
whispered wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a Monero supporter (and owner and future user once more widely adopted) because like cash, no one can tell how much money you have in your wallet or who you're buying things from. With Bitcoin, neither of those is true.

> With Bitcoin, neither of those is true. How much money is in my Bitcoin wallet?

Once you give out its address for someone to send you what they owe you they will know, which is not the case with your physical wallet or your bank account.

Re: In praise of cash

#310

Post by [deleted] »

jk563 wrote: post #75
sotojuan wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heh, where I live in Brooklyn there are no places that take card for less than $20 (sometimes $10). It definitely required some adjusting.

And yet I'm living in a village outside Leicester in the UK and I've paid <£0.50 on a card/using Android Pay on multiple occasions.

[deleted]
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