I will always recall the chaos of being in a northern Minnesota tourist town (Ely) when the single fiber-optic line serving the region was cut. I sure was glad our group brought cash. All the people with only third party companies willing to pay for them some time in the future had their trips and plans ruined. But that's sort of a trivial example. It could be much worse.
And then there's the rent seeking inherent in any commercially provider payment service combined with enshittification. No single company payment system will remain "good" for long. Not that credit cards are good to start given the puritanism and censorship they impose. And that's not even mentioning the US state dept. control of those networks preventing donations to political groups like wikileaks.
Cash matters. Having some corporation promise to pay for your stuff 3 days in the future means giving up control. You might not care now, but you might care in the future when $localpolitics get dicey. Imagine not being able to pay for an abortion with $companypay because it's illegal in $company's legal place of operation.
Plus cash is just so much more convient and faster.
> Plus cash is just so much more convient and faster.
There are many reasons I'm not anti-cash, but I am really struggling to think of a single example of this specific statement being true. Just acquiring cash at all means I have to take time out of my day, repeatedly, to make withdrawals. Then I have to carry it securely (as well as the cards I need to get hold of more), which is annoying at the best of times and pretty much impossible when I'm out running, say. Handing cash to a merchant means they need to figure out change, and eventually I end up carrying a bunch of coins and they are even slower to spend than notes. Boarding buses was so much slower when each person paid in cash. Paying for a beer or meal needed the staff to take the money back to the till and return with change. When going abroad I need to use notes and coins I'm unfamiliar with. Honestly, when is cash faster?
I have to agree with this. Stating that cash is more convenient is just false. It might be more familiar to some, or more culturally accepted, but saying it's more convenient than just touching the machine with your card or phone - outright false.
That's all completely separate from the fact that cashless payments shift immensely shifts the power balance and takes away all of your payment privacy - irreversibly.
Yeah, I usually carry some cash in local currency. But I often end up with coins I can't be bothered to figure out or with a ziplock bag of currency I ultimately never end up using in a drawer at home. And, if I were really stuck in a place that unexpectedly required me to use cash for everything I almost certainly wouldn't have enough with me.
Cash is faster in situations where you tip. You don't need exact change, just cost of service + tip and you can walk away.
I still love using cash in restaurants because the credit card dance adds 10 minutes waiting at an empty table. The server always drops off the check and runs, as if I'll need to think about the 43 dollar bill, getting them back is a whole thing, then waiting for them to return with my card and 3 receipts I don't want is another.
Since I'm in the states, i'm already tipping. I put down a few bills and go about my way. Same for things like pizza delivery, why pay part on credit then tip at the door(because basically no company gives the e-tips to the driver, you're just donating money to the company at that point).
Tipping in cash requires having enough small bills to make the tip. I remember having to ask for change in small bills or break another $20 to have the right amount for tipping.
Also, the switch to chip chard should mean faster credit card payments. The server brings the terminal, you enter the tip, and then tap or dip your card. That is how it works in Europe and Canada. I hope we can avoid the printing and signing to receipt that happened when I visited London.
I tip at restaurants, pubs, hairdressers, taxis (and likely more that aren’t front of mind) where I live in the UK. It’s as quick as saying “make it <x>” to round it up, and done.
Cash in restaurants pisses me off because it limits my consumption to what I can afford with the cash I’m carrying. What if I fancy the most expensive main, or a really nice whisky at the end of the meal?
Try to give a random person $100. Can they accept credit cards? Unlikely. Do they have the random cash app installed you use? Maybe. Do they have a bank account? Depends on where you live, and it could take days, and you have to bring long numbers with you and input them into your banking app.
Give them $103, where they don’t have change and you don’t have singles. Give them $337, most people don’t carry around that much. I ran into this problem recently paying contractor. I could have gotten enough cash from safe but neither of us could likely have made the exact amount.
If you choose common app like Venmo or PayPal, they likely have that installed. It is annoying to do the dance about which app to use. But the transfer is done before can get more cash. With contractor I was glad they took Venmo instead of having to write check.
>Plus cash is just so much more convient and faster.
You mentioned "puritanism and censorship" as your main issue with cards (and I assume with other digital payment systems), but to the best of my knowledge that's only an issue with online payments, for which cash isn't really possible at all. Unless you feel that sending bills in an envelope to some postal address you see on a website to be fast and convenient.
When I pay with cash the transaction is settled in literally 15 seconds. When I pay with a card it takes days, involves dozens of people and many capital and mantainance heavy systems which are extremely fragile. Additionally the digital payment services provider will take their relatively large cut so the process of the transaction can drag out over even longer times and greater costs. With cash you pay only the cost and tax and you need not ever think of it again.
The experience of using cash is very simple, fast, and reliable. In the future digital payment systems may become those things but unless you're in an urban area they currently are not. Your experience of using digital payment systems in person in, say, a coastal megalopolis differs significantly from using it to buy a shovel at a hardware store in a small town. At best (with credit or debit cards) it's almost as convient as cash, most of the time.
If I want to exchange value with another human person cash makes it easy and simple. It is far from easy with digital systems involving arbitrary third party corporate persons.
And then there's the rent seeking inherent in any commercially provider payment service combined with enshittification. No single company payment system will remain "good" for long. Not that credit cards are good to start given the puritanism and censorship they impose. And that's not even mentioning the US state dept. control of those networks preventing donations to political groups like wikileaks.
Cash matters. Having some corporation promise to pay for your stuff 3 days in the future means giving up control. You might not care now, but you might care in the future when $localpolitics get dicey. Imagine not being able to pay for an abortion with $companypay because it's illegal in $company's legal place of operation.
Plus cash is just so much more convient and faster.