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Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

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Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#101

Post by mandmandam »

throw0101b wrote: post #74
pasabagi wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's often pretty hard to do public protest without breaking some kind of law, even if you do everything you're supposed to. I'm not a fan of the truckers (the loud horns were totally infuriating) but the fundamental problem was that the police didn't want to move them on, not that they were breaking the law.

> It's often pretty hard to do public protest without breaking some kind of law, even if you do everything you're supposed to. All movements start small, and if you want to have your movement be a success it involves bringing more and more people over to your point of view / side. One can be disruptive in that you hold a rally or march to raise awareness, and be seen (in numbers) by folks on the street. Marches / par…

That argument was used (a lot) to decry suffragette protests and desegregation protests.

I for one am glad that women and black people didn't take it too seriously.

You may want to read some MLK - he had some very clear words about the liberal who demands civility in the face of oppression.

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#102

Post by ryandrake »

adamiscool8 wrote: post #99
ryandrake wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wasn't commenting on the legality of the asset freeze. I was responding to OP's attributing it to "if you decide to hold political opinions that are not in line with the ruling elite." As far as I'm aware, they did not survey the population and then take action against people with the wrong opinions.

A distinction without a difference. The ruling elite doesn't have to survey the population. They sandbagged the population into alignment with their own opinions, then strong-armed holdouts and specifically targeted them along every possible vector (social, legal, economic, etc.) for their adherence to wrong beliefs. I shudder at how much worse this could get in a fully cashless society.

So, everyone in the population of Canada who disagreed with the ruling elite's opinions was personally "strong-armed" and "targeted"? Or only a subset of them? If it was just a subset, could there have been anything that distinguished much of that subset apart from the rest of the people who weren't "targeted?" Maybe some event they took part in or helped?

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#103

Post by smarm52 »

The comments and the article don't mention the positives of "cash"; Physical currency.

And really, it's more trouble than it's worth.

The number one benefit of going full cashless is just controlling inflation. It's MUCH easier to regulate supply if the supply isn't physical.

Also it's expensive to make and expensive to maintain for little real benefit.

And to solve the problem of vulnerable people not having economic access: Make accepting government cards required; It's the same argument for cash, but doesn't run into the difficulties of physical currency.

Piketty, T. (2014). Capital in the twenty-first century. Harvard University Press.

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#104

Post by threeseed »

olalonde wrote: post #19
gaganyaan wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What regulations, specifically?

AML/KYC mostly.

No. We shouldn't make it easer for criminals to conduct terrorism, human trafficking, fraud etc just to make it slightly more economical for startups to compete with Visa/Mastercard.

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#105

Post by adamiscool8 »

sbarre wrote: post #98
adamiscool8 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The stuff they were protesting was very real, and those measures specifically caused disruption to hundreds of thousands of people's lives and sleep for months on end. The government turning to wartime measures so that privileged Ottawans living in some of the most affluent areas around the nation's capital can withstand a few honks for a few weeks is absolutely preposterous.

Lol do you actually live in Ottawa? Calling downtown near the Parliament buildings "the most affluent areas around the nation's capital" is pretty hilarious.

Is it no longer the most expensive part of downtown? Obviously there are rich suburbs.

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#106

Post by sofixa »

stavros wrote: post #16

I really hate paying by credit card (I don't like asking the bank for permission to spend my own money), but it's so convenient that I can't bring myself to carry cash any more. I have a really nice small wallet that I can store a few notes in, but I need a compartment for That's literally the entire reason I pay by card nowadays, I just don't like carrying coins.

This is the main reason why card/phone payments are taking over. It isn't some grand conspiracy by banks/shadowy cabals/governments - it's just much more practical than to pay with cash. Also the fact that it costs less to accept card payments only than deal with cash for small places (coffe shops and the like).

The correct course of action here is government regulations ensuring an even playing field for payment providers, transaction fees caps, and strong privacy protections around them. Not luddite nonsense like forcing cash to be accepted everywhere.

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#107

Post by sbarre »

throw0101b wrote: post #89
Magi604 wrote: post #45

I feel like it would be easy to just mandate stores to have to allow for cash transactions. It seems simple to enforce too, just walk into a store and try and by something with cash. If not, report/fine. As a Canadian, I also feel like there are so many more pressing issues right now, like housing, employment, inflation, immigration. Does this cash/cashless issue somehow affect one of these things?

> I feel like it would be easy to just mandate stores to have to allow for cash transactions. While cards have fees, cash has overhead too: you need to go to the bank for deposits, make sure you have enough change, worry about people walking in robbing your till (thus traumatizing staff), keeping a balance (to reduce 'shrinkage' from employees). Yes, it is "easy" to mandate it, but that is adding a 'regulatory burden…

It's also problematic for the thousands of solo micro-businesses that operate in markets and pop-ups now (i.e. Etsy IRL). Most of them have a phone and a Square dongle, and that's it.

Asking all those one-person shops and merchants to start carrying around a float and writing out paper receipts (or having some kind of battery-powered till+printer) is a pretty big burden.

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#108

Post by AnotherGoodName »

janice1999 wrote: post #6

Governments really need to break the Visa and Mastercard Duopoly. Not mentioned in this article, but certainly related, was the Canadian governments unprecedented step to freeze hundreds of bank accounts of protestors during COVID protests using their Emergencies Act. While I couldn't be more politically removed from the protestors, using a legislative power envisioned for war like conditions to personally ruin prote…

It’s actually super easy to do but the public will hate it. Pass a law that credit card surcharges MUST be added onto the final price.

That 2% cashback you get for using your Amex isn’t due to Amex generosity. That’s literally what retailers pay.

Right now I will absolutely use my cc for anything I can. It’s literally cheaper than cash and users of cash subsidise all my purchases. The only way to fix this is to force the surcharges on the cc users so cash users aren’t subsidising the price. But good luck getting that passed as law. Everyone either doesn’t care or thinks they are getting an amazing deal from the 2% back. It’s got to the point where stores that add a cc surcharge will be called out on social media when all they are doing is preventing cash from subsidising credit cards.

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#109

Post by matthewdgreen »

mattmanser wrote: post #41
siliconc0w wrote: post #7

Cashless is convenient but effectively amounts to automatic inflation. Not just from the merchant fees but making it easier to slowly raise prices/fees/tip %. Plus whatever % of the population is dumb enough to revolve credit and get buried in debt.

There's fees for handling cash as well. They're just less obvious. In the old days, those armoured vans used to have to go to stores every single day at peak times (Xmas, etc.). Plus you've got to pay for bags of change to be delivered. You've got to pay for a safe, insurance for your safe, plus a hard limit that safe is allowed to hold. If you're going to go over you need to request an on demand pickup from the cash…

I worked in a smaller, independent guitar store for a few years in the 90s. We received enough cash and checks that once a day someone would have to walk over to the “night deposit” slot and toss a bag in. Our cash handling cost was equal to my salary for the 30 minutes it took me to make that walk, plus the risk that I would get mugged ($0 lost over a few years.) Often the owner would rake out enough to cover his spending needs, so there was an additional (slightly illegal) tax benefit to using cash. Armored cars and pickup only comes into play when you’re a big store doing loads of transactions, and then economies of scale probably keep the costs modest as a percentage.

Credit cards, on the other hand, can easily run you 30% on a $5 transaction here in the US, due to the unjustifiable fixed + percentage structure. Maybe it’s a little better in Canada.

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