As long as there are politicians, there will be cash.
You can't (or don't want to) accept bribes, buy votes or hire hookers/strippers with traceable payment methods.
You can't (or don't want to) accept bribes, buy votes or hire hookers/strippers with traceable payment methods.
* The typical bribe is, you do something in your role as a government official, and later you legally get a high-paying job, or they pay you $100K-$200K/hour in speaking fees (the low number is Bush Jr's and the high number is Hillary's, AFAIK), etc. Works great with legal electronic payments.
* "Buying votes" usually means, either you promise government money to a group of voters, or you promise a donor to do something when you get elected. Either way, you're buying votes with the government's money so no need for cash. If by buying votes you mean that you're Trump and you're paying for your campaign, again, nothing illegal there, I doubt he travels with stacks of cash.
* "Hookers/strippers"... I dunno, whatever the problem with electronic payments there... I think a politician is in the best position to find a workaround, certainly in a better position than the average customer. In particular, if the workaround involves getting someone else to pay for it electronically, a politician is in a great position to reward that someone.
[0]http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/03/10/emperors-club-all-a...
- http://qz.com/262595/why-germans-pay-cash-for-almost-everyth... - http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/coming-clean_switzerland-tighten...
Even sticking to the richest countries, Germany has 61%, Ireland 69%, Italy 86%.
http://en.finance.sia-partners.com/wpfiles/2012/12/Illustrat...
There is a popular domestic EFTPOS scheme used in Germany. A lot of small shops (especially restaurants) don't use it though because it leaves a papertrail (ie. you have to pay taxes on it). Often Maestro/VPay will be accepted though.
In terms of card payments in general: A lot of people associate (credit) cards with being poor, in debt and having no control on how you are spending your money. Cash on the other hand is associated with having control on how much you are spending. I've even seen people apologizing at the register, because they are paying a "small amount" ($5+) with card.
Almost all big stores accept credit cards now though after the European union cut the fees.
There are other countries (Iceland springs to mind, but I know there are others) where electronic payment methods are so dominant that someone can get along fine without having any cash.
Europe can't always be nicely generalized. There are plenty of differences between individual European countries.
Yeah, sadly. It seems like a lot of Germans associate card payments with having no spending control and going in debt.
At least credit card acceptance has improved since the fees were cut by the European Union. I'm still voting with my wallet and putting most merchants without card acceptance on my "ban" list.
>that someone can get along fine without having any cash.
UK probably as well, especially with contactless payments.