In our cashless society, we need to take digital jail seriously • Hacker News Board

Re: In our cashless society, we need to take digital jail seriously

#41

Post by ska » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 12:04 AM UTC

henryfjordan wrote: post #25

deathanatos wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The state of Massachusetts no longer operates toll booths along some of its toll roads. You either have an EZ Pass, or (for +$0.60 more) you get a photo taken of your plate, and a bill mailed to you, which is online or check only, no cash option. Or you stay off the toll roads, I guess. IDK what NY's policy is, but it is rather hard to cross the southern Hudson without toll. If you're renting a car, and you don't hav…

If Massachusetts says you owe money, they must accept cash. That's the point of cash being "legal tender", you cannot refuse it if someone is trying to settle a debt. That said, it might be really hard to figure out how to pay in cash.

That's potentially interesting: legal tender means it must be accepted to settle certain debts and contractual obligations, but it doesn't mean you must accept it for transactions.

Something like EZ pass seems potentially gray area; can they just say "well don't use these roads if you don't like the payment terms" ?

I suspect you are right that with a state agency they probably have to provide some way for you to settle a debt (plus possible penalties) in cash, but they don't have to make it convenient.

Re: In our cashless society, we need to take digital jail seriously

#42

Post by forty » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 12:05 AM UTC

forty wrote: post #36

walterbell wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No, that battle is lost. Cashless is easier and more convenient. Incorrect, the battle is partly won in several U.S. cities (including NYC & SF) which passed laws to mandate acceptance of cash. However, cash-acceptance laws were mostly motivated by the unbanked, who are now being used to justify the introduction of nation-state CBDCs. China's CBDC is two-tier and preserves retail bank competition. People close to t…

Can you pay taxes in cash? I don't think it's possible in my country.

Also as noted in the article, things like electricity, internet and other utility cannot be paid in cash either here.

Re: In our cashless society, we need to take digital jail seriously

#43

Post by upsidesinclude » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 12:05 AM UTC

jakobdabo wrote: post #13

throwaway22032 wrote: post #3

The simple answer is to reject the cashless society. In the medium to long term it's simply incompatible with any reasonable definition of freedom. Surveillance is bad enough, but a system that allows governments to arbitrarily "turn off" thousands or millions of people at the push of a button is too powerful to not be abused. Even the mere existence of such a system has a chilling effect. Which I suspect is precisel…

> The simple answer is to reject the cashless society. No, that battle is lost. Cashless is easier and more convenient, it's hard to beat that. We need more constitutional human rights. It's not okay to take or freeze somebody's money/property without any court decision. Edit: some of the answers assume that I'm against cash or that by saying "battle is lost" I mean cash is gone; My point of "cashless winning" is tha…

We don't have limited rights. You need to work on understanding that rights are not granted. Rights are inherent. Enumeration of rights is only to emphasize the importance

Re: In our cashless society, we need to take digital jail seriously

#44

Post by pretendgeneer » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 12:05 AM UTC

MithrilTuxedo wrote: post #17

throwaway22032 wrote: post #3

The simple answer is to reject the cashless society. In the medium to long term it's simply incompatible with any reasonable definition of freedom. Surveillance is bad enough, but a system that allows governments to arbitrarily "turn off" thousands or millions of people at the push of a button is too powerful to not be abused. Even the mere existence of such a system has a chilling effect. Which I suspect is precisel…

I thought cashlessness without a trusted third party was a solved problem. https://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf

The surveillance and lockouts bitcoin allows makes even the most Authoritarian government blush.

Re: In our cashless society, we need to take digital jail seriously

#45

Post by jakobdabo » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 12:05 AM UTC

JacobThreeThree wrote: post #21

jakobdabo wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The simple answer is to reject the cashless society. No, that battle is lost. Cashless is easier and more convenient, it's hard to beat that. We need more constitutional human rights. It's not okay to take or freeze somebody's money/property without any court decision. Edit: some of the answers assume that I'm against cash or that by saying "battle is lost" I mean cash is gone; My point of "cashless winning" is tha…

>No, that battle is lost. How is it lost? Jurisdictions like New Jersey, Rhode Island, San Francisco and Philadelphia have legislated that businesses must accept cash. There are bills being worked on at the federal level. https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/4395

Lost in the sense of look around how people are spending their money. I'm very happy for that law, and hope common sense will prevail and cash will be around for a long time. But you can't deny that vast majority of money transactions in the modern world is cashless. Hence my point that the battle is lost - if you take away average person's right of using their credit cards or bank accounts, how are they supposed to pay their bills or buy food?

Re: In our cashless society, we need to take digital jail seriously

#46

Post by dragonwriter » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 12:05 AM UTC

JacobThreeThree wrote: post #21

jakobdabo wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The simple answer is to reject the cashless society. No, that battle is lost. Cashless is easier and more convenient, it's hard to beat that. We need more constitutional human rights. It's not okay to take or freeze somebody's money/property without any court decision. Edit: some of the answers assume that I'm against cash or that by saying "battle is lost" I mean cash is gone; My point of "cashless winning" is tha…

>No, that battle is lost. How is it lost? Jurisdictions like New Jersey, Rhode Island, San Francisco and Philadelphia have legislated that businesses must accept cash. There are bills being worked on at the federal level. https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/4395

> How is it lost? Jurisdictions like New Jersey, Rhode Island, San Francisco and Philadelphia have legislated that businesses must accept cash.

It's lost because they’re mostly legislating that “storefront” businesses must accept cash when both having storefronts and accepting cash are things businesses are less interested in. So, what they have actually done is accelerate the death of storefronts rather than assure that cash is usable.

Re: In our cashless society, we need to take digital jail seriously

#47

Post by Gigachad » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 12:06 AM UTC

spicybright wrote: post #2

It sounds like the author lives somewhere upper class. I've never been to a business that can't take cash.

In Australia, covid basically kicked it off. Now several regular businesses have stopped taking cash. Not high end rich people stores. Places like IKEA and chain restaurants.

Re: In our cashless society, we need to take digital jail seriously

#48

Post by upsidesinclude » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 12:06 AM UTC

forty wrote: post #36

walterbell wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No, that battle is lost. Cashless is easier and more convenient. Incorrect, the battle is partly won in several U.S. cities (including NYC & SF) which passed laws to mandate acceptance of cash. However, cash-acceptance laws were mostly motivated by the unbanked, who are now being used to justify the introduction of nation-state CBDCs. China's CBDC is two-tier and preserves retail bank competition. People close to t…

Can you pay taxes in cash? I don't think it's possible in my country.

Sending a check in the mail is not the same as having a digital currency. You can add cash to the bank account and write the check.

Re: In our cashless society, we need to take digital jail seriously

#49

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 12:07 AM UTC

forty wrote: post #36

walterbell wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No, that battle is lost. Cashless is easier and more convenient. Incorrect, the battle is partly won in several U.S. cities (including NYC & SF) which passed laws to mandate acceptance of cash. However, cash-acceptance laws were mostly motivated by the unbanked, who are now being used to justify the introduction of nation-state CBDCs. China's CBDC is two-tier and preserves retail bank competition. People close to t…

Can you pay taxes in cash? I don't think it's possible in my country.

[deleted]

Re: In our cashless society, we need to take digital jail seriously

#50

Post by walterbell » Wed, Feb 23, 2022, 12:07 AM UTC

forty wrote: post #42

forty wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you pay taxes in cash? I don't think it's possible in my country.

Also as noted in the article, things like electricity, internet and other utility cannot be paid in cash either here.

US Postal Service money orders can be purchased with cash and used the same way as a certified check. This works for utility payments. Mobile phone companies take cash as payments, in both their dedicated retail stores and a large network of affiliated airtime merchants. In some countries, there's a mini-economy for the trade of airtime minutes within cellphone networks, based on physical stores that can convert cash->minutes. M-Pesa was one of the earlier success stories, unifying payments and digital identity, but it was anchored in real-world ingress points for cash.

Cash & digital can be complementary.