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India Just Flew Past Us In the Race To E-Cash (backchannel.com)
New submitter mirandakatz writes: Since India's prime minister banned 86 percent of the rupee notes in circulation last month, citizens have been waiting in hours-long lines for ATMs. But these circumstances have also created an unexpected progression: a burgeoning cashless economy. At Backchannel, Lauren Razavi explores how India is now beating many Western countries in adopting mobile payments, and how demonetization has triggered a radical shift toward reimagining India's enormous informal economy as a data-driven digital marketplace. From the report: "Before last month, Paytm, a mobile app that allows users to pay for everything from pizza to utility bills, saw steady business -- it was processing between 2.5 and 3 million transactions a day. Now, usage of the app has close to doubled. 6 million transactions a day is common; 5 million is considered a bad day. Rather than being forced to idle away time in excruciatingly long lines, 'people are proactively exploring other ways to settle payments besides cash,' says Deepak Abbot, senior vice president at Paytm. 'Now people are realizing they don't need to really line up, because merchants are starting to accept other forms of payment.' All of this has created a newfound system that practically incentives mobile payment. With so many people queuing up at banks every day -- and a lot of Indian bureaucracy to wade through in order to open a traditional bank account or line of credit -- the appeal of more convenient digital alternatives is easy to understand. According to a report in the Hindu Business Line, as many as 233 million unbanked people in India are skipping plastic and moving straight to digital transactions. 'Cash has lost its credibility and payments are no longer perceived in the same way,' says Upasana Taku, the cofounder of Indian mobile wallet company MobiKwik, which reported a 40 percent increase in downloads and a 7,000 percent increase in bank transfers since demonetization. 'There's chaos at the moment but also relief that India will now be an improved economy,' she says."
That's a race I don't want to win.
The summary makes it sound like losing access to cash is a good thing, as long as it can be replaced by a number on a server in all cases. It is not.
Who's "Us"?
Note that the socialist utopias are moving to e-cash.
I'll keep my dollars, thanks. No need to bother the tax man every time I buy something from a local vendor.
As long as you didn't drive to said vendor on a government-funded road under government-funded street lights using gas that was purchased from a government-inspected pump (so as to make sure that you pay for a gallon and get a gallon) then sure. Don't bother paying the same sales taxes that the rest of us pay.
Drill baby drill - on Mars
Sounds like a horrible thing.
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
Because computer security and how it seems to universally suck.
That was the turning point of my life--I went from negative zero to positive zero.
It's not a race, it's a tool that's useful for certain economies and not others.
In India, 9 out of 10 transactions are conducted in cash. The informal economy is enormous in India, and is an economy that the government has little oversight over, and thus has little ability to collect taxes. E-Cash enables all transactions to be logged, tracked, and mined for data, which gives the government greater control over their economy.
This is about the Indian government being able to collect taxes better, pure and simple. It also helps reduce corruption and illegal transactions which is a good thing, but the main focus is taxes.
Who the fuck is "racing to e-cash"?
"Cash has lost its credibility"
To whom? Bureaucrats? Banks? The NSA?
This sounds very much like that contrived "Internet of Things" we're supposed to all need.
-Styopa
India has devalued its largest denomination bills by surprise, in an attempt to get folks in the "black economy", and this even means professionals like doctors, to account for their cash and stop avoiding taxes. Everyone has a very short time to deposit the old bills in a bank, or lose their value.
The problem with this is that because it was a surprise, India did not print new bills first, and does not have the capacity to print them at anything near the number required.
So, right now many businesses are shut down because they can't pay their employees. It seems that it was the case that these employees were paid in cash and might not be able to get bank accounts.
Their economy is going to take a hit.
Bruce Perens.
The dose makes the poison.
Meanwhile in the real world, it's evil capitalism that gets things done. Before the government can steal something and give it to you, it first has to be invented by someone willing to take risk or built by someone that expects to get paid.
This includes the machines that paved the road, the street lights, the gas pump, and the gasoline.
Socialist snow plows are built by capitalists.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
This idea that you can't buy something without the government knowing about it leads to the inevitable you can't buy something without the government approving of it. This fear of not being able to trade freely has been around for a long time. The bible had the mark of the beast.
If you don't believe that you are tracked on other purchases you are not doing any homework. Donate to the wrong event or charity and suffer the consequences. Legally you can donate to the Political Party of your choosing, but is that action truly protected. How about donating to the wrong author, artist, public speaker, etc..? Ever see how Professors in Universities get treated when it's revealed that they are Republicans? They may not be fired directly, but you bet your ass that they are censured and ostracized. Plenty of examples for you to find if you look.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.