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Brazil's government-run payments system has become dominant

economist.com

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Re: Brazil's government-run payments system has become dominant

#361

Post by timewizard »

whimsicalism wrote: post #286
nirui wrote: post #206

I'm thinking, maybe controversially, centralized national payment service like this should be government-run based on my experience with Alipay which is a digital payment service in China. Due to it's commercial origin, Alipay is filled with unwanted ads and traps. Almost every time I made a payment with it, a pop up prompts me to enlist their Ant Financial LOAN service either now, or being prompted for the same ques…

payment services should absolutely have a public option, as should many other basic eservices like email, mychart, etc. the issue is that our government in particular is incompetent, has legal difficulty hiring for merit, and has public sector unions (which is effectively empowering people to negotiate against the collective democratic will of the people). i’ve worked on internet projects with the feds before, basica…

> the issue is that our government in particular is incompetent

Our federal government is huge and our state governments are small. Precisely the opposite of how the founders configured it. This is part of the problem.

The states need to band together and develop a cooperative solution and then push it upwards to the federal level.

This is a lot easier than centralized planning and management of an entity the size and scope of the US. We have a lot of offshore territories and two states. This complicates things more than people care to admit.

Re: Brazil's government-run payments system has become dominant

#362

Post by lazyasciiart »

bananalychee wrote: post #352
tetris11 wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish the homeless in London did this, I'd happily give a few pounds here and there if it were easy to. Back when I had cash on me at all times, I would think nothing of it, just toss a coin. Now in our cashless society, I found myself at a loss to do anything about the people suffering in front of me

Can't even be penniless these days, you need a fancy electronic device, a data plan and reliable access to an outlet before you can beg for charity. Sad world.

And then people won't give you money because "look at them with their phones! I'm sure that could have paid rent for a month"

Re: Brazil's government-run payments system has become dominant

#363

Post by WinstonSmith84 »

SwiftyBug wrote: post #8

I've been living in Brazil for the last 20 years. Pix revolutionised the way we transact in Brazil. I've used Pix to pay for things that cost only cents, and I have a friend who bought her house using Pix. The system just works for any transfer amount. And it's so easy to use. Its speed is truly baffling, and so is its reliability. Never have I failed to make a Pix payment because of downtime. I never cease to be ama…

> Cryptocurrencies don't stand a chance.

Now, try to use Pix outside of Brazil - it's not even used in other Mercosur countries, what's the chance of having that adopted in other countries... And, that's problem #1.

How much do you trust your government with your money? A system like Pix don't stand a chance to get a worldwide adoption - maybe people are naive but governments won't unify to adopt a common system controlled by just a single entity / country.

What we may however end up with, are dozens of systems like Pix, one for each country, union, etc. Still cryptocurrencies as-is remain relevant (see point 1)

Re: Brazil's government-run payments system has become dominant

#364

Post by mondobe »

xenospn wrote: post #175
SwiftyBug wrote: post #8

I've been living in Brazil for the last 20 years. Pix revolutionised the way we transact in Brazil. I've used Pix to pay for things that cost only cents, and I have a friend who bought her house using Pix. The system just works for any transfer amount. And it's so easy to use. Its speed is truly baffling, and so is its reliability. Never have I failed to make a Pix payment because of downtime. I never cease to be ama…

Brazil is amazing. I bought a coconut from an old man who was walking barefoot on the beach using my phone.

Why was the beach using your phone?

Re: Brazil's government-run payments system has become dominant

#365

Post by lazyasciiart »

tialaramex wrote: post #321
leereeves wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd hate to see a system like that where I live, because the government will abuse it. We've already seen Canada freeze bank accounts of protestors, and US officials put protestors on the no fly list.

This doesn't make sense as a prioritization. Oh no, my government might be run by nazis -> Let's make the government services crap The nazis don't need to use your crap government services, so you're just pointlessly making things worse, this is the same delusion as "But it's illegal". Why on Earth would crooks care whether what they're doing is legal? I suggest: Oh no, my government might be run by nazis -> Ensure t…

Unfortunately you've described the essential American view of government.

Re: Brazil's government-run payments system has become dominant

#366

Post by bokohut »

The long game pattern and cycle is obvious for those with the vision to see beyond the horizon. Politics obviously has a foundation in the choice of countries to control and operate their own payments systems given the value of the data and the social connections it reveals, aka national security. All security starts at the foundation and without financial security one is indebted and controlled by another. As the world enters a new cycle around those changing patterns the basis of the control they seek is founded in individual continuity without exterior influence by their adversaries. This can be seen today with the financial controls that can greatly impact an entire country filled with individuals that have no association with the reasoning of why the restriction was placed to begin with. We have many options today for instant cross border payments and as more and more countries move to own and operate their own payment platforms so too will those cross border payments methods grow in adoption foregoing an adversaries oversight and control.

I speak from direct experience in these words as the architect and founder of multiple acquired payment systems over the decades because this past December I was contacted by an African country seeking to build, own, and operate their own payment platform backed by their energy reserves. The concerns and threats around a country's monetary system are real and in time we will see more and more countries taking up this initiative to cut out the middlemen.

As a bonus over and above countries moving in this direction we can also see businesses doing the exact same thing over the last decade. Thee who controls the money also has induced influence over the users of that money as we see this more and more through 'progress'. Feel free to replace the word "money" with the word "data" in my previous statement as well.

Stay Healthy!

Re: Brazil's government-run payments system has become dominant

#367

Post by Vilian »

djrj477dhsnv wrote: post #313
dyingkneepad wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, I can vote so that the thing my government does to me is something I want. The foreign corporation will always be exclusively interested in doing things to me that generate revenue for them.

> Well, I can vote so that the thing my government does to me is something I want. You better hope that your interests closely align with those of millions of your compatriots. And that no one with political power has a personal vendetta against you.

>You better hope that your interests closely align with those of millions of your compatriots.

corporation NEVER has my interests in mind, so coordinating millions is easier

>And that no one with political power has a personal vendetta against you.

same argument can be used with corporations

Re: Brazil's government-run payments system has become dominant

#368

Post by matheusmoreira »

seydor wrote: post #317
SwiftyBug wrote: post #8

I've been living in Brazil for the last 20 years. Pix revolutionised the way we transact in Brazil. I've used Pix to pay for things that cost only cents, and I have a friend who bought her house using Pix. The system just works for any transfer amount. And it's so easy to use. Its speed is truly baffling, and so is its reliability. Never have I failed to make a Pix payment because of downtime. I never cease to be ama…

What about tax evading people? Is the system used to tax audit people?

> Is the system used to tax audit people?

You bet. Every pix transaction is reported to the brazilian authorities.

Re: Brazil's government-run payments system has become dominant

#369

Post by rebanevapustus »

xinayder wrote: post #112
rebanevapustus wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Brazilian government is a *very* corrupt authoritarian oligarchy. I would take any US company over that any day.

Yet we, a developing "third-world" country, have a better functioning payment system than the US, where it takes days, or even weeks, for a wire transfer to land, and you pay a huge amount of fees for that. Cases in point: - To transfer money to a broker, I need to pay around $5 in transfer fees via ACH or wire - I want to change the custody of my stock market assets from one broker to another, and it will cost me $7…

It's cool that "we" have a payment system, however, I would never be comfortable using something whose people in charge are those that keep us (not me particularly because I've gladly left the country almost a decade ago) in this misery.

I use Crypto for everything you've mentioned. It's instant, almost free, and alexandre(he deserves a lowercased a) can't take my money if he feels that writing his name in lowercase makes me unworthy of my civil rights.

Re: Brazil's government-run payments system has become dominant

#370

Post by luqtas »

marcosdumay wrote: post #252
Galatians4_16 wrote: post #125

Despite a global move towards a cashless society, 54% of Brazilians now opt for cash withdrawals.¹ 2024 has seen a surprising reversal, as cash usage makes an unexpected comeback , defying predictions that the world was moving toward a cashless society. With rising cybersecurity threats, concerns over financial privacy, and economic instability, consumers and businesses are increasingly turning back to physical curre…

That second link is completely wrong about Brazil though. Not uninformed, just every time Brazil is mentioned, it says the complete opposite of the reality. And the claim in the first article is about using cash at any time. And it's by a ridiculous small margin. So in fact it's claiming that almost half of the population doesn't use cash at all.

more than 50% of the rural brazilian population doesn't hav internet access (that's 36 million people) [0]

the central bank admin. director says physical money is still the base of brazilian transactions [1]

[1] https://exame.com/economia/dinheiro-em-especie-ainda-e-a-bas...

[0] https://www.ecommerceupdate.org/noticias/brasileiro-esta-dei...

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