Does cashless society discriminate against the poor and elderly? (2019)
blogs.ischool.berkeley.edu
blogs.ischool.berkeley.edu
Currently, all I can do is politely decline and insist that I neither have the Play nor Apple store; I still find it uncomfortable even giving away my phone number. I couldn't even get into my gym the other day, since they'd transitioned to app sign-in only (phasing out barcode tags); I'm forced to beg the attendant to look me up by phone number every time.
*EDIT: I hope ranting about smartphones in a cashless-ness thread isn't too off topic
Also they REALLY dont like hearing about how the phone they have now is obsolete and theres no way to get parts for it, or its just too far gone and they'll need to buy a new phone. I feel for all of these people as I totally agree with them.
Plus, even if you live in an area where a car is required you have the option to opt out and move (housing crisis aside), which isn’t an option to avoid smartphone requirements.
That is reality in a lot of the world including Europe, China, and South America.
I agree with the sentiment of not generally needing to have a car and fortunately that is the case in most of the world (except the USA)
Note that I am not arguing one way or another, but outright dismissal is not an appropriate counter argument.
It's the same stuff just in a cycle.
Cellphones are completely different. My "daily driver" smartphone, bought in 2017 for ~1/4 of my monthly salary, is obsolete and I have rooted it in order to continue to install security updates. This has locked me out of my Danish bank account.
My mum's 1980s PSTN phone still works, even when the mains electricity is out, no technology change required.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_telephone [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulse_dialing
Because they're not against "state of the art" or even the notion of "state of the art" things in general, they're against smartphones in particular.
People are also able to finding smartphones (and the requirement to have one for many aspects of dealing with the government and corporations) bothersome and annoying without having to (a) hate new technology in general, (b) have it be due to them being old.
Amazingly (I know right? Who would have thought!) this can be true even if some people back in the day disliked landlines.
It's almost like each technology is not just some magic miracle everybody should adopt with no downsides and all fun and games, but something that people can be pro or against it on a preference basis (in fact, some tech can also have bjective negative consequences and side-effects).
Case in point I always disliked smartphones, and they become a thing at the time I was a teenager. And I know kids who were born with them who hate them. So there's that.
Of course most landline calls today go through dubious VoIP links and poorly maintained copper infrastructure, which is why I qualify with "from several years ago."
However I won't use a smart phone for money or install an app for random things like a gym membership or a restaurant's menu. Never mind banking or medical stuff. It's really hard to verify what an app actually does under the hood and too many reports of even banking apps not getting SSL right and such. I know too much about how bad software development is security wise to trust any of this implicitly.
Thanks but no thanks.
But drop your mobile device and not only are you f'ed, you have to invest in getting it fixed. And until then you're a social outcast.
To say nothing of the "sorry, you MUST update or else."
Same stuff? Hardly.
Older generations have not been asked to replace their expensive tech every 3 years. My grandparents bought one phone and one TV set and kept them for the rest of their lifes. Something is wrong with today's tech and not with the elderly people who are not able to adapt as fast as zoomers.
If it was invented when you were 20-40 it's new but you're willing to adopt it after some consideration.
If it was invented after you're 40 it's against the natural order of things and must be destroyed.
If they'd be complaining about their mobile phone bill being higher than their landline bill, fine - but that's not the case.
I'm pretty sure the last land line phone my parents bought was under 100 bucks and it would still be working just fine 10 years later (that is in addition to the fact that we kinda transitioned from analog to ISDN around 2000, and then back). Compare to a new mobile phone every 3 years if you want security updates.
Sure you could say "just don't go to those places" but then you're slowly withdrawing from society as these things gain in ubiquity.
"Normal Land Line" wasn't something that came from nature. It is a sophisticated technology invented by humans with the same User Interface flaws and Laggard-Ranting that every generation goes through.
When Mixed-Reality becomes popular, I'm sure there will be many complaining "why can't I just have simple smartphone" and there will probably some Gen Zers sympathizing with them and reminiscing about the simple days of smartphone.
Newsflash: Adaption and Evolution is the name of the game. I can understand if a disabled person complains inability to use gadgets(although smartphones have better accessibility features), but you can bet your bottom dollar, most of these people whine because they aren't curious about the world and stubbornly refuse to adapt and the rest of the world has to bend over backwards to accommodate them?
Just a few of those factors might not be so bad but with all of them it could become impossible to do legally-required things like buying car insurance without being effectively legally required to look at Google ads. Or renewing your passport without agreeing to a software EULA that forbids you from ever suing Apple for leaking your private data. All of this "it's just opting in to societal progress" crap is why Experian even ever had your data to leak[1] it in the first place, and why Google and Braze and every other tech company has it too.
0: https://i.imgur.com/dgGvgKF.png 1: https://threatpost.com/experian-api-leaks-american-credit-sc...
Yes, it’s also exponentially more powerful, but it leaves a lot of people behind.
Don't feel bad about asking them for access to the service that you paid for. Here are some good reasons for not installing their app:
- I forgot my phone at home
- My phone is broken, I stepped on it when I got out of the bed
- I can't install any apps, the memory is full and I don't want to delete my family videos
- I don't know my Appstore password right now
- This is a work-provided phone, I cannot install any apps on it
- My phone contains confidential client data, I cannot install any apps on it
- I am an investigative journalist, is your app certified for high-security applications?
- My kids have the phone, I didn't want to interrupt them playing games
- Does your app run on Nokia?
- Does your app run on Windows phones?
- Is your app on f-droid, my phone only supports f-droid?
- I am sensitive to radiation and cannot use any radio device
- I am a minimalist and I live phone-free!
I tried that in an interview. They never called back. /s
Well to that one they could reply that you better not turn on a SDR to see what radio waves are passing through you at this and every moment. XD
But it seems pretty clear why they are doing that: Besides saving some time for the waitstaff, I only now realized that by using Apple Pay, they get at least my name and email address… I wonder if I‘ll end up getting spam by either the restaurant or the POS vendor.
It also creates a completely new and entirely avoidable problem: I don‘t have strong signal in that restaurant, and they don‘t offer a wi-fi either. All in all, while the waiter probably saved 20-30 seconds (waiting for me to unlock my phone or get my card from my wallet, tap it, and select my tipping option), it took me almost 5 minutes to complete payment on my side.
I do not think the merchant gets a name or an email address.
* do they put up signs, and make sure not to let you in, if you don't have a phone?!
* what if it just doesn't work with your phone. you ate, try to pay, doesn't work.
* what if you have a phone, but no way to pay via phone, eg, no credit cards?
I just don't get it
Frankly, after eating, if presented with "you need a phone to pay", my response would be to ask, "so you refuse to take cash?".
If they did... well, their problem. Not mine.
This is not true
The proprietary payment app in turn relies on a proprietary app for electronic ID which authorises bank transactions. And those demand a relatively recent version of iOS or Android and that the phone is not rooted. The e-ID is only available to citizens and residents, which means that people such as foreign students or guest workers can't get one. (And then the privacy and security issues of the e-ID system is a can of worms...)
I don't generally want to say that too loud though because some politician will point out that they still have their eyes and fingertips so why can't we use biometrics instead.
Might as well regress to hot iron cattle branding.
I don't think so. Certainly it's hard to argue that at least a feature phone that you're willing to give out the phone number for is well-nigh mandatory.
As you say, go back not that many years and cash/travelers checks and appropriate ID (drivers license and/or passport) were really all you needed in general. In addition to phone, it's really hard without a credit card today as well.
I’ve run into, for real, the issue of “essential” apps in Germany not being available in the US App Store, like public parking for the commuter lot in a town on the other side of the country.
Re: gym, when I signed up I didn't have a phone at all. After being asked twice, I finally lied and said yeah it's um at home.
The problem with the app barcodes is simply that they are slow to load, nonstandard, and not open source.
I think a common standard, lightweight, open source app would be perfect. Stocard is proprietary, but at least it loads quick and organizes all of the cards in a uniform way.
I don't like these slow, buggy apps that bury their barcodes.
The brightness problem is real, and getting the angle right can also be a challenge, although that seems like an issue with the current quality of barcode/QR readers. I assume that could be solved if anyone cared.
Keychain barcodes are insecure, easy to damage, easy to lose, and provide zero real identity guarantee.
Phones at least can offer the level of identity guarantee that 2FA does, and largely solves those other problems.
I get and fully support what you're going for, but friendly reminder that (in America) having an ID can actually be somewhat difficult in a variety of circumstances where people are most vulnerable to being left out. It's actually kind of a hot button issue
1) Many people who were born in the US didn’t actually ever get one! This is more likely to affect people who were not born in hospitals, particularly older, poorer people.
2) Where is it? The state you were born in, and probably* the county. If you’re now in a different state, the procedure for getting it sent to you could be tricky.
3) How do you get a copy? For Texas, that used to be up to the county where you were born, with all the variability that implies (Harris Co: 4 million. Loving Co: 100.) Now that’s “state records office”… with a catch. For any of you here, it’s marvelously simple and not that spendy. If you don’t have a credit/debit card and/or don’t use the internet… that’ll be $80 and “up to” an 8 week wait. No idea about any other state.
So what if you don’t have/can’t get a copy of your birth certificate? Every state is different, but they all accept some defined set of alternative documentation: school records, military records, medical records, attestation from the doctor/midwife that delivered you… all things that someone who is having a hard time laying hands on their birth certificate is sure to have to hand.
If it is QR code based, take a screenshot or picture of the QR code. I just login with the photo app anymore lol.
I can't help but feel it wasn't so long ago it was widely considered a bad idea to open arbitrary PDFs of questionable provenance.
I don't know who is arguing for bank accounts without ID though.
The arguments back like, "I have nothing to hide," or, "cards are just convenient," aren't centerist or neutral, they are the banal nihilism of people suited to scheduling prison trains, imo.
If the government doesn't provide such a thing that is ok but it must grant citizen's the right to issue their own medium of exchange with a regulatory path to pay taxes if it fulfills the inflation/deflation criteria.
You get to pick negative rates or inflation. There is no other option.
In Australia the gov doesn't give the first nations people assistance, they give them cards that denote how they can spend the money. It's nanny state in the highest.
But as the technology gets better and more reliable this gets rarer and rarer so that in the end it discriminates against those who already lack a different kind of power: social and political power. That is, the poor, the elderly, the sick, the disabled, the poorly educated, the illiterate and innumerate, those whose grasp of the local language is poor. I'm sure the list could be expanded.
And makes it more difficult to anyone who is outside their country of origin. Many payment apps are limited to residents and nationals only, while others are avaialble on specific country app stores.
Like the migrant family fleeing from they country I met this evening. They told me they were stranded here while travelling to a better country.
Neither her or I have banking apps that can talk to each other. But I was able to gift him enough for dinner for his family today. Quick interaction,from my wallet to their hand, no QR code to be scanned, no database to be updated.
In Sweden a while ago an entire chain of supermarket had to close for a weekend because some hack that happened to a company in USA completely blocked their capability to process payments.
Also occasional downtime of debt card network does occur.
They can scan your card with a thing that doesn't use power, but most places I saw that were at places like gun shows where they shouldn't have had an issue taking a check either, since either way there was gonna be some kind of background check.
For context, I sold stock out of my IRA a third(ish) time recently, because I had so many issues stemming from a set of phone scammers who hijacked calls at the carrier level in 412 around the time I got laid off from my last full time role.
I hope that the same folks doing that didn't also impersonate the IRS when I tried to call the last time -- I'd been told over and over if you have questions, call about how to declare income, and the person I got was super rude, even threatening. Made some smart ass comment about whether I was taking notes "my senator" in a sarcastic tone of voice when I tried to ask how to declare what little income I had.
Anyways TL;DR: lots of places don't handle loss of power well, or even just reverting to 90s era social Norms in an emergency ;-)
In the UK, we have "basic bank accounts". These are aimed at people with bad credit history, and offer no line of credit, but do provide a debit card, which may also be used at an ATM.
How are there 70 year olds today that worked throughout the 90s and 2000s without coming across a computer?
I do wonder if these problems will eventually fizzle out, as more and more people have been exposed to technology throughout their lives and will be able to use it in their old age.
While there may be some arguments against a cashless society from a privacy point of view, it's hard to argue with the convenience and cost savings that you get from going cashless.
I remember, growing up in a more “End Times” focused evangelical denomination, they were always talking about how barcodes or credit cards are maybe like the “Mark of the Beast” number in the book of Revelation, without which you can’t make any transactions. That’s paranoia, of course, but it’s also kind of a good point. A fully cashless society using our typical methods puts a massive power into the hands of the government and a few very powerful corporations.
It also tilts the power differential in favor of employers of all sizes. a local small business coffee shop I frequent doesn’t pay super well, but they do tipping. The owner can easily keep track of how much tip money comes in and uses that as an excuse to employees that they can tolerate getting paid only $8/hour because they have tips. The employer also has control of the tip money that’s paid in cashless form, and it’s not unheard of for employers to take some of that money or withhold it. I prefer to use cash for more and more purchases, but for basically all tips, I tip in cash. (And I agree tipping in general is lame, but I don’t want to punish employees for that.)
Manufacturing, retail. Those are just two things that I can name where I personally know people in their 50's who have no real access to computers.
>I do wonder if these problems will eventually fizzle out, as more and more people have been exposed to technology throughout their lives and will be able to use it in their old age.
I bet they don't fizzle out. Technology is always changing. At some point in their past, even the 99 year old who couldn't turn on a smartphone today was hip on the current technology of the day.
Oh, they saw the clerks using them in the office when they came in each week for their paychecks, and later on, engineers and maybe even other contractors bringing laptops on-site, perhaps even helped support a kid doing a CS degree, but plenty of 70 year olds today never had a work-related reason to touch one.
My dad spent 50 years doing construction. His employer did attempt to teach him how to use the laptop they got him those last few years he worked in the early 2010s, but settled on basically providing him an on-site secretary (recent college grad) to use it for him.
And even more so in a generation where many women stayed home and didn’t enter the labor market at all, or all those who worked any of the various manual labor jobs. Some restaurants still don’t have digital records of orders, etc to this day.
I agree with your first sentence, but the summary doesn't necessarily follow.
The convenience and cost savings are not free. You are the product. Moving to a "modern society" doesn't need to involve enriching the marketing networks of the planet.
He loves to argue about convenience or as he sees it, massive inconvenience.
Recently when I refinanced I got a mortgage and the servicer (can’t remember their name as they sold to mrcooper and then to WellsFargo) that funneled everything through their app that wanted to auto withdraw from my bank. I tried to pay by check and couldn’t get an address out of them despite multiple calls and hours on the phone.
I'm currently in Malaysia. They have a mobile ewallet/payment system (tng). It accepts foreigners with fairly large monthly limits (around $5500/month). I can buy TnG balance with Bitcoin/Crypto/Cash/Barter, and it's accepted almost everywhere (even more than MC/Visa).
I'm happy with this being an alternative to cash. The way I see it, companies can only be evil once they have leverage. But using multiple different systems, you take that leverage away from them. Cards have leverage on the day-to-day payments, online and international market. To take it away, use services that bypass them.
Banks still have leverage on the large transfer, wealth holding market. I'm yet to find an alternative to that (There is USDT/USDC but it's banks with extra steps. Crypto is an alternative but the volatility is too high).
- barter economy when the power or network or website goes down.
- all transactions tracked.
- can have your money disabled by a 3rd party.
- transaction fees, particularly when traveling internationally.
- magnetic fields suck. Plastic gets brittle.
- As more banks participate in ESG and experiment with what they can get away with, people may lose access to their funds if they hold the wrong beliefs or lack good social credit score. This is already in place in China and all the big banks are looking at dipping their toes into this game.
PayPal already experimented with this and back-peddled when their stock dipped as a result. A few dozen big banks in the US are now participating in ESG. Only time will tell what they dare to implement.
Did you mean China, or is there something that happened in Canada that I'm not aware of?
The legislators of my state and several other states are actively fighting banks that exhibit this behavior. None of the small banks I interact with will ever participate in that concept.
[1] - https://www.heartland.org/publications-resources/publication...
These scores are currently a big deal on the right, since they tend to be based on socially liberal values and tend to push companies into left-leaning policies, but the left should be just as concerned about the trend given that the trend is to reduce the diversity of policies among the very large companies which (seek to) control our lives.
And the nation state is just the corporation with the local monopoly on violence.
The chips in credit cards aren't damaged by magnetic fields. Mag stripes will eventually be discontinued. (For instance, cards from Mastercard won't have mag stripes after 2033.)
> transaction fees, particularly when traveling internationally
Many banks offer no international transaction fee cards. Charles Schwab Checking is one such example.
> magnetic fields suck. Plastic gets brittle
Cash is filthy disgusting and deteriorates. Also risk of receiving counterfeit bills.
"Cash-less" society means loss of anonymity.
The matter is not with options, but with lack of options.
Everything else may be more convenient in various ways, but it’s more complicated, too. And with unexpected things that can happen.
There is a sufficient hair trigger on fraud alerts these days that you really need a diversified set of cards when traveling--especially internationally. And, yes, get some cash though in post-COVID travel world I'm probably now stuck with a bunch of random foreign cash I'm never going to spend. (Pounds/Euros I can deal with but a bunch of other smaller currencies I doubt I can easily exchange.)
Travel notifications can help. But I've even had random declines for $20 purchases at US gas stations.
But yes, multiple SEPARATE funding sources and cash are a minimum when traveling, even within the US imo.
Inasmuch as they can understand a payment card equally well. They don't understand acquisition of [cash] money, but equally don't understand why the magic plastic rounded-rectangle works. They can use a payment card more easily than cash in my limited experience (as a parent and uncle).
A payment card would seem to either be magic (it always works!) or confusingly not consumed in its use but still not work again later (gift card).
I am 100% dead set against "cashless society", not because I am "unable" to use anything else, but because it is less private, less empowering, and outright less convenient. Sure, I'll sometimes give in to the financial surveillance industry to get money back, or to make returns easier, or to do online purchases, or to avoid trading fomites during Covid. But ideally I want to transact in cash. Make the decision to spend a given amount of money exactly once, and not suffer the same transaction multiple times as I see my agglomerated statements at the end of the month.
With friends, no fucking Paypal, Venmo, Zelle, or whatever fly by night crap is popular this week that undoubtably forces some nonconsentual "terms" at me. Never mind creating yet another insecure account that has to be checked every month lest I end up responsible for a company's negligence. Cash - we settle and then we forget about it. Sometimes it's higher, sometimes it's lower, most of the time it evens out, sometimes it doesn't but we assume it does and move on with our lives.
Like maaaaaybe in the far future if phones are ever personal computing devices that represent individuals, and we have the security properties granted by systems like Monero, and software designed for end users and not surveillance companies, then I'd be happy to settle with digital money. But it's foolish to jump the gun and pretend that any of the junk currently being pushed by surveillance companies represents that sort of idyllic future in any way.
There's a period when you don't have all the required paperwork, and it's really hard to open a bank account, or sign up for payment services.
Many banks in Germany use the same ID verification tool, and it does not recognise all passport types. Some banks require a residence permit or registration certificate, both of which can be hard to get.
If you have a bank account, it can still be shut down or restricted because of your government back home. This happened to Americans in 2019 and to Russians recently.
It's also a pain for visitors who need to join the system.
At last, phones get lost or break. When I lost mine, it took me two weeks to regain access to everything, in part because of 2FA catch-22s. At least I had money to replace it.
American regulation made it too much work for certain banks to keep American customers. From what I've heard it's still an issue.
Probably preaching to the choir, but I briefly participated in a documentary of sorts which may be of interest [1].
But the elderly? If you're receiving social security checks and paying utility bills, surely you have a bank account and a debit card?
> The elderly are less able to manage cashless payment methods, especially without transition support. If local authorities or utility companies do not support cash...
Since when have utility companies ever accepted cash? The elderly have spent their whole lives paying utilities by check. And they've been using ATM cards for decades. If they can use an ATM card they can use a debit card, since they're the same card.
This article throws "elderly" into the headline but gives zero actual evidence for that group.
> check-cashing outlets provide a range of convenient payment services in one location. They cash paychecks, sell low-cost money orders with stamped envelopes for making long-distance payments, and serve as agents for utility bill payments and electronic money transfer services, such as Western Union
So unbanked people have to use (often high-cost) proxies to participate in these sorts of economies. Probably contributes to their unbanked status since it's hard to save enough to open a checking account when fees constantly eat into savings.
As to the point about elderly, according to the FDIC survey [^2], the under/un-banked rates among older age groups is actually lower than, say, the 25-34 year old age group. However, I think OP's post still stands because 1. If your retired being unbanked is arguably worse, as if you have to use the previously mentioned check-cashing outlets, you're going to eat through any savings you have a lot faster, and 2. there's a technological argument as well, and if smartphone adoption becomes more and more a requirement towards accessing finances, then technical literacy rates become a new barrier and that tends to be associated with younger populations.
[^1]: https://www.brookings.edu/articles/bringing-unbanked-househo... [^2]: https://www.fdic.gov/householdsurvey/2017/2017report.pdf
Many companies will set kiosks in areas with a large number of unbanked so they'll go to these kiosks at the local 7/11 or whathaveyou and then charge anywhere from $3-$5 fees.
But it gets worse. If someone has a $100 bill and they put in $3, that kiosk will take that $3 as a payment fee and apply $0 towards the bill itself. Not only that, it happens more than you'd think.
People flat don't understand the predatory nature of many of these companies.
Did you actually check? Mine do accept cash.
I've never lived anywhere where any utility company had a branch you could just drop by and pay your bill in cash.
And mailing cash through the USPS is obviously insecure and high-risk. The USPS goes expressly out of their way to not recommend it.
As far as I'm aware, utility bills are all debts (money owed for a service already given), so they're required by law to accept cash one way or the other. It's not the same as going to a shop and putting items in your cart; there is no debt in that case so they aren't required to accept cash.
(Also, in practice, mailing cash is a lot more reliable than most people make it out to be.)
You can have a cashless society that still uses checks, debit cards, credit cards, money orders, cashiers checks, wire transfers etc. All these can be managed or used by visiting a local branch or with a phone call.
Plenty of people still pay their rent with checks and I've never been at a sit down restaurant in the US where I could pay with Apple/Google Pay but I can of course use my CC/Debit Card.
All of the methods listed above work without power as one commenter suggested would be an issue. Its really not...
Overdraft fees are egregious but they're also something you can opt out of and is just another form of credit.
All you need to participate to this degree is a bank account that offers a debit card which is accessible and possible to the vast majority of the population including the elderly - they're not hoarding all their cash under their mattress. In the US to open an account at any major bank is an ID and maybe an initial deposit whether that be a cash/check/incoming transfer etc.
It has never been easier to go to a library/school/friend's place and sign up for a free bank account that will ship you a debit card that will also reimburse you for ATM withdrawal fees.
The group that should really be the focus is the underbanked - often those less fortunate.
Including seniors in this category of 'discrimination' feels odd - I know of some who have no problem paying their bills, shopping, living life etc without a smart phone or computer.
Society can't be beholden to the past forever - progress is made and individuals have to choose to participate if they want to use new things that are accessible only through certain tools.
This isn't any different from when we moved from the telegraph to the telephone - you had to go and buy a landline to participate. The same is true of getting a passport to fly/sail to different countries as countries also further add requirements for updated passports and IDs (a la Real ID requirements in the US).
Loss of anonymity in transactions is not «progress». It is the opposite.
> if they want to use new things that are accessible only through certain tools
The issue is with "things being from some point on accessible only through certain tools*.
Deleted comment
But don’t “punish” them w/higher rates as some people would view that as some sort of discrimination.
When you talk about less parking spots people will shout you are taking away the parking spots for the disabled.
Ok then only get rid of normal parking lots and add more parking lots for people with special needs and make it easier for them to apply for access.
I'm not against cash I just think that it is standing in the way of negative interest rate policy. The IMF suggested an exchange rate Vs cash and that the central bank should pick it's interest rate policy to minimize inflation to exactly zero and only cash will keep inflating.
What specific services do you depend on that require a smart phone?
There are other things in life that are certainly a lot more convenient with a smart phone. I rely on public transit, bussing and trains, and if I didn't have a smartphone that would make it a lot more difficult to navigate. Sure I could pull up a paper map of the bus routes and estimate what routing might be the most optimal to get to my destination by hand, and call up the transit agency operator line with my buss stop ID to ask when the next bus is slated to appear, but its infinitely easier to just use google maps and be done with it. When I am on the first bus and anticipating transferring to another bus, unless I knew that bus stop ID for the transfer point ahead of time I cannot call ahead and know when my transfer bus is arriving, for example.
Why no physical authentication, e.g. YubiKeys?
(And certainly there are a lot of things on the web that are hard to go without and I assume the typical case where someone doesn't have a smartphone doesn't have easy access to a computer either.)
If you think of it like that, then it's awfully inconvenient. But what you do, what I think most of us used to do, is pair that errand with another, like grocery shopping. Chances are fairly good there is an in-network ATM in route to the grocery store, if not at the grocery store. It only adds a minute, maybe a few minutes, to a trip you were going to make anyway.
Are cheques really that common in the US still? In Ireland, and as far as I'm aware, the rest of the EU, it's rare to see a cheque at all these days. Almost everything is paid either on cards or some other form of electronic transfer.
The Netherlands has a supermarket (Marqt) which does not accept cash. Thankfully, there are alternatives. Marqt is also so expensive that you're either a yuppie with a debit card or can afford to pay a shopper if you're getting your food there.
That would be like an older person complaining they "have to have a smartphone" to see pictures of their grandkids, when it's actually the other around. Because smartphones exist, they can see pictures they otherwise would not have seen at all because no one would have driven to the store, printed them out, and mailed them (or had a camera to take them with) without that technology.
Contrast that to something like parking, where using a phone app provides convenience and decreased operating costs, but the service itself is in no way dependent on people having phones.
Ah, that makes sense. I've never used those. I've used taxi cabs but maybe I am missing out or paying more than I should.
There are numerous streets that dont have meters now and just a sign to "pay on this parking app"
Additionally every bank has an app and some of them don't have branches in every city so they say "just deposit checks via mobile"
It was a shame because I would have liked to give out maps to the kids so they could navigate/orient themselves.
A few days afterward, I actually went to the trouble of printing nice legal-sized color versions of the map at Staples to give to the kids as mementos. Sure enough, they loved looking at and discussing those maps just like I did as a kid.
Next time we go I'm printing maps ahead of time so we can have them while we're there.
There were Sony hearing aids discussed here yesterday, requires an app to configure.
Aunt's hottub/pool requires an app to configure.
Many Universities require them.
That said, there are manual workarounds to almost everything requiring a smartphone. They’re simply less efficient.
Another store has online only coupons and just killed using checks, too. They do have a free ATM at least.
I love the convenience but it needs to be an option, not an obligation.
Anything less privacy- and liberty-conserving is a strict downgrade from cash.
Why should anyone prefer some band of zealots controlling their financial lives?
Perhaps the elderly are just … wiser?
How is the pseudo-random subset selected, assuming the presence of an adversary controlling part of the transaction data and a significant percentage of nodes?
The subset of hosts is determined by the hash of the transaction.
Related, last night I started watching this B-movie on Netflix, called "Johnny Mnemonic." (Had never seen it despite being a Bill and Ted fan.) From the 90s but set in 2021. In it there is a criminal underbelly consisting of folks who reject oppressive technology called the "Lo-Teks" ... and I thought wait a minute, that's me! That's my gang. Even get to hang out with Ice-T. :-D
I've decided it's fine for now, they already have my payment details. At least I made a conscious decision and don't believe they are selling it.
I'm looking to quit in the near future, as the product has been going down hill. But I have a few things to watch first.
I stopped carrying cards.
Oh yes absolutely. The number of $100 bills are more than $1 bills and less than 20% are in circulation inside US [1], meaning significant portion of that is being used for shadow economy. I am pro cash, but the US could probably print less $100 bills. Of course, there is also other currencies, financial instruments and crypto that can be used instead of $100 bills.
> Maybe in the end it will be better to have this shadow world.
It's hard to tell, but we do know that forcibly trying to remove the shadow economy is extremely tough on normal people while bigger players are already diversified with alternatives (gold, crypto, other currency) to have much impact. See India for recent example [2].
[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/03/04/there-are...
[2] https://money.cnn.com/2017/01/04/news/india/india-cash-crisi...
One of them was a victim of identity theft in which a five figure loan was made on her name, and the other had a legal order due to a debt from her ex-fiancee due to a cancelled wedding.
Hmm, working as intended? Or do you think legal judgments should be easily avoidable?
What is your goal with this comment?
Reminder that identity theft doesn't exist. Someone stole something from the bank, and the bank stole back from your coworker.
If I remember it right.
So anyway it seems the article's question can be answered with a resounding No! if folks in Africa see this as cheaper than ordinary currency.
Of course it does. But so did society that started adopting the telephone, or automobiles, for people who didn't have money to buy telephones or cars, or didn't want to get on board the technological change. And what doesn't discriminate against poor people, by the way? The poor are always getting the short end of the stick. You come up with ways to help them, but railing against a new technology because it disadvantages some has never worked.
I'm not saying I'm in favor of cashless, but whatever the technology is, life adopts it and moves on. People have to deal. Or they die and get replaced with people who do. You will never get 100.000% of the people on something that takes away what you used to rely on.
Personal telephony and mechanized personal transportation have been empowering assets, extras, while transactions in the market are basics - you live and could live without cars and phones, while living without money is a completely different enterprise.
> railing against a new technology because it [has] disadvantages
That is not what the article is doing. And the real disadvantages are beyond «the discrimination of the poor and the elderly».
> People have to deal
A circular assumption in which "history justifies history" and explicitly poses nothing.
And if they cannot, bad for them?
My mom has developed an eye problem, that - while not making her totally blind - makes impossible for her to use Pos' and ATM's, let alone the (crappy) bank website or app. (with a lot of difficulties, in the "right" lighting, in the comfort or her house, she can still read the screen and type on her devices).
She is "technologically advanced" (within limits, she has an iPad and Facebook and e-mail, and a smartphone and Whatsapp and can use them).
Since a couple of years she doesn't use anymore her card(s) simply because she cannot see the Pos or ATM display or keypad, and she has switched (back) to cash-only for the small day-to-day payments, while I manage all the other ones.
If shops started to implement cashless only she would be severely affected, and deprived of the little things she now still enjoys doing, like going out to get a coffee, buy some groceries, etc.
But equally, gasoline used to cost $1/gallon. People used to communicate by mail and have to use pay phones.
Then people came to be expected to buy more efficient cars, pay more for gasoline, and communicate electronically. And by the way, many people who aren't dealing successfully with things getting more expensive are because they're being very inefficient. Think of all the houses and cars that were totally inefficient before higher energy prices caused them to upgrade?
Life moves on. People are forced to adapt.
You're off by a few zeroes. UPI transactions totalled 1 trillion USD last year. Figures from last month can be seen on their website - nearly $135 billion for September 2022.[1]
[1]: https://www.npci.org.in/what-we-do/upi/upi-ecosystem-statist...
Vegetable vendors have been using this QR code payments thing even pre-UPI (2016) with paytm (that works only with paytm)
If you grow up with the idea of "money" as a stack of coins and notes that disappear as they're consumed, does it create a different perspective on spending and saving than seeing it primarily as a score on a screen?
I can recall a bit of a parenting crisis back in the '80s, where there was concern that children wouldn't learn to read an analog clock face; there's probably some knock-on factors about understanding fractions and modulo arithmetic. I'd expect similar needs for physical money; change making is fast mental math.
And I'm talking about in San Francisco. Where we are far too proud of our tech & tech literacy. I don't think I've seen a single credit card only business in town... Though maybe I'm just oblivious.
The former always implies the latter, but the reverse is not necessarily true: not all change is progress.
So need some form of secure identity that can scale and be secure even on insecure terminals.
Perhaps a combination of password, mobile phone number, PIN and email. Then you could verify the transaction with the email or phone. But you could also opt to not use phone and email for a less attestation that you transacted.
If not for those, you could trivially purchase a Visa/Mastercard prepaid card at every convenience store, shrink-wrapped, no signup / personal details necessary, and then top it up with cash.
You can get a reloadable if you provide SSN and DOB. You don’t need to pass a credit check.
Do elderly and poor people not have SSN and DOBs?
This is puzzling... How does refusal to accept cash from X create a frictionless experience for Y?
It can be very slow for both the customer and the employee to deal with the transaction.
I think it's a good idea for children to have a bank account and to manage their own money.
Here in the UK, debit cards with contactless are available from age 11.
Apple Pay's minimum age is 13, and Google Pay's minimum age is 16.
i.e. a dystopia
Once again, genuinely confused about why one of these approaches are being talked about a lot more on this thread. If I am missing something very obvious, I would appreciate a pointer.
It’s why private arms ownership (in the millions) and ability to use cash (also in the millions) IS one of the (only effective) checks and balances.
The idea of the state having effective state-based checks and balances to restrain the power of the state is nonsense. We tried that and got a military-industrial takeover of all 3 branches via universal communications surveillance of every single judge, congressperson, and chief executive/cabinet by unelected military spies. There are people in the USG who know the location tracklogs and call history, iMessage history, iCloud Photos, email contents, and fb/wa/ig DM contents of every single mistress, sex worker, bag man, and drug dealer that services every individual member of the executive, legislative, and judicial branches, as well as their entire personal and professional staff, and can threaten or blackmail any of them at will. In theory there are checks and balances over these spies, but in practice once they have that kind of power, they have enough power to keep abuses of same out of the newspaper.
It’s like the police stopping police crime; it is a nice idea in theory but does not happen in the real world.
To maintain a free society you must maintain the practical ability for millions to do things that are legal but that the state REALLY does not want them to do. Payments are #1 on that list as they enable publishing and organizing.
Also, the USG does call in missile strikes on US citizens (as well as their entire families) that they simply don't like, and checks and balances don't stop that at all:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anwar_al-Awlaki
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Abdulrahman_al-Awla...
The ways they have of making your life inconvenient escalate to making your life completely unlivable (e.g. unable to buy food/clothing/shelter, or ride a bus) in the absence of anonymous payment systems.
BSA/PATRIOT make it illegal to issue payment cards in the US that aren't strong identity-linked.
Cash isn't so much useful because it's cash, it's useful because it's not linked to identity. If anyone could buy prepaid payment cards that didn't require identity, then this would be much less of an issue (but would still link multiple transactions together in time and space, which is its own privacy issue).
Of course laws against abuse should be developed so that when you need the service you are protected - but the main thing is that the service is not forced on you.
So yes, right now they can "unperson" someone in a targeted fashion across a dozen (for now) unlinked channels working together in different ways, which we just see happening to people we consider undesirable, extreme, or hateful etc.
But they cannot do that in a serious and automated way at scale across all channels to a more average person (right now the more manual approach is too much effort). They are currently proposing+building APIs that enable it at scale.