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>The state is anti-innovation

Let's look at "innovation" in consumer banking:

-Debit and credit cards physically show numbers that give full access to the accounts 40 years after modern public key cryptography was invented

-A very modest improvement to this system, known as PIN and chip, came to the U.S. recently after years in Europe and Asia; the Wall Street Journal has called this very basic change a "nightmare" more than a year into implementation, doubling average transaction times to 13 seconds (!!) in an informal test. Only 28 percent of merchants supported the technology.

-Checks physically show numbers that give full access to accounts

-The standard consumer "friendly" way of moving money electronically, ACH, involves banks FTP-ing massive text files to one another, batch processing them overnight, and clearing transactions in 24 hours or more.

-There is no used standard for peer to peer consumer electronic transfer

-Massive data breaches by banks have become incredibly common

-The response to endemic fraud is to revoke cards and mail new ones and/or to repair and monitor credit on an ad hoc basis

> physically show numbers

That is backwards compatibility, not lack of innovation. You have (some) cryptography on the chip.

> Checks physically show numbers

That, again, is backwards compatibility.

> ACH, involves banks FTP-ing massive text files

Yes, that sucks.

> no used standard for peer to peer

Wire transfer?

> Massive data breaches by banks

Massive data breaches by everyone, this is not a bank problem - this is an industry-wide problem.

> response to endemic fraud is to revoke cards

What is your point here? Would you prefer to revoke a certificate instead? But we already established that pesky concept of backwards compatibility and real world.

> A very modest improvement to this system, known as PIN and chip, came to the U.S. recently after years in Europe and Asia.

Chip and PIN is a private initiative. I don't know why it took off in Europe/Asia and not in the USA, but it has little to do with the state.

That would be mapgrep's point, I believe.

> that private firms cannot be trusted to manage financial transactions despite the massive history proving they can

Can they? We saw a decade ago multiple countries having to each provide over 500 billion USD to such private firms to stop them from going bankrupt… that doesn't seem like a "massive history proving" they can manage private banking.

It might have something to do with them being used to having a government that isn't utterly dysfunctional from top to bottom. Such a thing is possible, believe it or not. Their health systems are certainly less complicated and bureaucratic than US systems, despite being public.

Yes, and Sweden's population is 3% of the US's, and the country is very homogenous ethnically. There are other factors I'm sure, but these factors are very important.

In any event, I detect the unmistakable tendency of many in the American Left to view the Nordic countries as something approaching utopia[0].

[0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/stop-the-scandimania...

Utopia is probably not the right word- but when you start reading about places in the world where things actually work in a non-corrupt way, there is a certain point where it hits with the power of a revelation. You suddenly go, wait, politicians that take bribes get in trouble for it? Corporations that abuse their power have to account for it? What kind of crazy world is this? You suddenly realize that there is a higher standard out there, and all the shoulder-shrugging non-explanations of "well that's just how government is" start to look pretty flimsy. It's not that I expect utopia; it's that I think we can do better than complete and total failure.

Over 16% of the Swedish population is foreign-born, which is higher than in the USA. Only about half of that is from other European nations, and that is mostly from Eastern Europe. Iraq is the second most common country of origin after Finland.

Yeah, sure, they have it easier because of the demographics. Still, doesn't change the fact that their government is much more functional. You're being overly defensive.

>but these factors are very important.

No they aren't.

As a slight counter-point, an oligopoly similarly has little reason to innovate.

Think about how slow adoption of "secure" methods of transaction are in the US and them having made fraud our problem and not their problem.

Also look at how little they innovated relative to the profits they were making. Hard to do worse.

> despite the massive history proving they can

Goldman Sachs, Wells Fargo, HSBC, LIBOR for christ sake. If anything the private sector has proven that they will do their best to fleece main street to line their pockets.

> The state is anti-innovation (think about how slowly government infrastructure has developed) and anti-consumer (imagine the DMV in charge of your money).

That some states are anti-innovation does not entail that all states, or even most states, are anti-innovation. Government dysfunction is a self-fulfilling prophecy, in that, a pervasive cultural belief that government is dysfunctional leads to a dysfunctional government, and the converse is also true.

Which isn't to say this is a good idea anyway, but your counterpoint isn't all that strong.

I imagine the rants when issuing currency was restricted to a state monopoly were pretty similar, and pretty similarly misguided.

"For example, if only the state was allowed to process financial transactions, we never would have gotten credit/debit cards."

Does this idea apply to small countries? It's possible that democratic pressure, by people who know what's available in Denmark etc. just across the border, would mean the country could end up getting credit cards, and then paypass, not much later than elsewhere. But nationalising the equivalent sector of the US banking system in 1950 would, as you say, leave everyone writing checks forever.

For the same reason, communism worked much better at catch-up industrialisation (just steal the blueprints for a steel mill, and build it) than for subsequent consumer products (where you need to experiment and feel the way).

"they want to nationalize all private banking." -

I'm not sure where you got that from. Whats on the cards is to create a central bank based system of payments. I'm personally not in favour of having to pay a fee to VISA every time I make a payment. I would envisage that this would work along side existing payments system.

"trusted to manage financial transactions despite the massive history proving they can" in peacetime yes. Beside that its a common good not under democratic control. Sweden as a state has small but very real risk of being invaded. There is a lot of work in Sweden at the moment to remilitarise the country. For example mandatory conscription has been introduced.

"For example, if only the state was allowed to process financial transactions, we never would have gotten credit/debit cards" - debatable conjecture. Still no one is looking to get rid of payment systems that are currently in place.

"If they had nationalized after this development, we would not have NFC payments or chips in cards" - again debatable conjecture.

"The state is anti-innovation (think about how slowly government infrastructure has developed) and anti-consumer (imagine the DMV in charge of your money). " - I'm not sure how to respond to this but I'll give a try. For an American example you can take a look at NASA, It is general acknowledged that you have something like a 14$ return on every dollar spent. This: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_spinoff_technologies does not look like ant invention to me

"This whole notion of "the state knows everything" and "only the state cares about you" seems completely dystopian." Well in a functioning democracy the state has the potential to be serving its citizens. It works fairly well in Scandinavia, but less so in Russia or China.

> that private firms cannot be trusted to manage financial transactions despite the massive history proving they can

I'm sorry, this is so laughably incorrect that I had to make sure I wasn't missing some obvious sarcasm markers. A history of massive, systematic failures that the state has continually needed to correct for, maybe. If only it were so simple as private = good and public = bad.

>The state is anti-innovation

Sorting algorithms are slow. Doesn't matter which one! I just know they're slow. Don't ever sort data. Ever. Sorting = slow = bad. You'll never convince me that different sorting algorithms have different characteristics and trade offs. Sorting is bad! Okay! End of story.

> they want to nationalize all private banking

That would be crazy. But I can't see where the article says that, nor can I see it said in the opinion piece by the chairman of the Swedish reserve bank which the article links.

The chairman of the Swedish reserve bank makes two suggestions:

1. Modify the RIX system of settlements in the reserve bank. One suggested modification is to extend its operating hours, currently it closes at 17:00 each day. I don't think anyone would consider that a radical proposal.

2. Force banks to handle cash, i.e. if you want to be a bank, then you have to let people withdraw and deposit cash at your branches.

This second point sounds almost bizarre, a bit like demanding that you can't be a restaurant if you don't serve food. But the current situation is that the major banks in Sweden have rapidly reduced the number of branches that handle cash. Swedbank, one of the big four, has roughly 100 branches in Stockholm, the capital, but only two of them handle cash.

You can deposit small amounts of cash in ATMs, about $1000. Anything beyond that and you have to make a trip to one of the two branches that still handles cash.

It is much easier to fight against a corrupt state than a corrupt conglomerate of private entities; at least the prior has the assumed ethos that its democratic and has the peoples' interest in mind.

Maybe it's more about risk management, in particular, mixing investment banking in where the public ends up on the hook.

> that private firms cannot be trusted to manage financial transactions despite the massive history proving they can

This has to be satire, or else you must have been asleep for the last 10 years.

You should read it again- it says "secure public control over the payments system", not to nationalize the banks.

In the USA, the Fed Reserve controls ACH, so not that far different.

" For example, if only the state was allowed to process financial transactions, we never would have gotten credit/debit cards. "

Perhaps the modern state but during a certain period US gov basically made the foundations for nearly all modern technology. Even Peter Thiel acknowledges this fact.

> "No comments on how crazy this viewpoint is?"

Lucky you're here!

> "The state is anti-innovation"

Not in Sweden, it isn't. Ad hominem all the way.

> "They're arguing that a monopoly of the state is better than a "monopoly" of four different companies"

There are examples in recent history that support this model: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Israel_bank_stock_crisis