Slashdot Mirror
Swedes Turn Against Cashlessness (theguardian.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: It is hard to argue that you cannot trust the government when the government isn't really all that bad. This is the problem facing the small but growing number of Swedes anxious about their country's rush to embrace a cash-free society. Most consumers already say they manage without cash altogether, while shops and cafes increasingly refuse to accept notes and coins because of the costs and risk involved. Until recently, however, it has been hard for critics to find a hearing. "The Swedish government is a rather nice one, we have been lucky enough to have mostly nice ones for the past 100 years," says Christian Engstrom, a former MEP for the Pirate Party and an early opponent of the cashless economy. "In other countries there is much more awareness that you cannot trust the government all the time. In Sweden it is hard to get people mobilized."
There are signs this might be changing. In February, the head of Sweden's central bank warned that Sweden could soon face a situation where all payments were controlled by private sector banks. The Riksbank governor, Stefan Ingves, called for new legislation to secure public control over the payments system, arguing that being able to make and receive payments is a "collective good" like defense, the courts, or public statistics. "Most citizens would feel uncomfortable to surrender these social functions to private companies," he said. "It should be obvious that Sweden's preparedness would be weakened if, in a serious crisis or war, we had not decided in advance how households and companies would pay for fuel, supplies and other necessities." The report mentions a recently-released opinion poll, which found that seven out of 10 Swedes wanted to keep the option to use cash, while just 25% wanted a completely cashless society.
There are signs this might be changing. In February, the head of Sweden's central bank warned that Sweden could soon face a situation where all payments were controlled by private sector banks. The Riksbank governor, Stefan Ingves, called for new legislation to secure public control over the payments system, arguing that being able to make and receive payments is a "collective good" like defense, the courts, or public statistics. "Most citizens would feel uncomfortable to surrender these social functions to private companies," he said. "It should be obvious that Sweden's preparedness would be weakened if, in a serious crisis or war, we had not decided in advance how households and companies would pay for fuel, supplies and other necessities." The report mentions a recently-released opinion poll, which found that seven out of 10 Swedes wanted to keep the option to use cash, while just 25% wanted a completely cashless society.
Even from a business owner's perspective, there's nothing that says your business has to accept cash payments
But if few businesses accept cash, and you can't actually use cash to buy groceries, then you have a de facto cashless society.
For businesses, cash means crime. Both employee theft and robberies. Cash transactions are also slower than just waving your phone, which raises costs. Cashless self-checkout kiosks are cheaper and less error prone than those that handle cash.
I spent two months working in Shanghai last fall. I ate hundreds of meals, visited dozens of shops, and exchanged money with co-workers. Of all those transactions, this many involved cash: 0.
Why would you want a cashless society? Having the ability to pay in cash doesn't require you to do so yourself. I can't wrap my head around the fact that there are some people who actively want fewer choices even when the alternative options require nothing from them in terms of action or cost.
As an individual, no, you don't want that. Cash-in-hand carries some obvious risks like loss or theft, and a few less obvious ones, like (hyper)inflation and devaluation. Money-in-the-bank comes with a "we won't steal from you, honest"-promise that is usually a national scandal if it gets broken, but it does happen like when a bank goes AWOL or bust overnight. Then there's the loss of control ("Cyprus template"). The obvious problems and their mitigations are well-known and well-understood. The other stuff, much less so.
For businesses, especially those sitting on the interface between numbers in bank accounts and cash-in-hand, it's easy to pretend that cash is nothing but a business expense that one had best dispense with. This isn't necessarily true, but it's the fashionable pretence.
For governments, cashless means unprecedented control. You know, civil forfeiture with less smell of "the government is stealing from me!" Which is exactly why economists are creaming their pants at the idea. Bank problem? Just steal everybody's bank balances and done. Bank runs? Impossible because without cash nobody can get their money out. Monetary policy, no matter how onerous, becomes much easier to just force onto the population. And so on.
So cash vs. cashless is an indicator how much the people is beholden to the local government. Which in turn might well be beholden to some other organisation (ECB, FRB).
Even from a business owner's perspective, there's nothing that says your business has to accept cash payments
But if few businesses accept cash, and you can't actually use cash to buy groceries, then you have a de facto cashless society.
Yes. Which is not very good for ordinary citizens. As a business, you're more or less beholden to the banks and the tax man anyway.
For businesses, cash means crime. Both employee theft and robberies.
These are well-understood risks. Much moreso than "digital bank robberies", but hey, if the bank promises they'll replace all losses then we can pretend there's no risk at all, right? RIght up until you want to hold them to that promise, of course. Just like insurance companies, only worse.
Cash transactions are also slower than just waving your phone, which raises costs.
Right up until the bloody thing runs out of power, throws a hissy fit, you name it. Besides, "waving your phone" is one of many cashless payment methods, all different, and a relatively new one at that.
I pay everything cash, complete with adding a few coins to minimise total item exchange where possible, and I'm not slower than someone using chip-and-pin. A little practice goes a long way here. Plus it gives me a keen insight in just how much cash I have available. I don't have to risk my entire bank account's balance every time I stick that card in a reader. Do you know the balances on all your ready payment methods by heart? How do you check? How do you account, how do you control your expenses?
Cashless self-checkout kiosks are cheaper and less error prone than those that handle cash.
If you choose to pretend fraud suddenly ceases to exist.
I haven't checked but I really wonder what happens if suddenly a bunch of unknown-to-the-system unbanked illegal aliens barge in and take your entire inventory with them. Over here in Europe we have a lot of those coming in by the boatload, and our politicians are entirely too weak to do diddly squat about it.
I spent two months working in Shanghai last fall. I ate hundreds of meals, visi
That all sounds like it takes more than two second.
It only takes more than 2 secs if you don't already have the WeChat app open. But that is rare in China. WeChat is like SMS, voice mail, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Skype, Facetime, PayPal, plus a lot more, all rolled into one app. If you see a pedestrian in America, there is maybe a 50% chance that they aren't watching where they are going because their eyes and attention are on their phone. In China, it is at least 90%.
Even if you don't already have WeChat open, you can open it while you wait in the checkout line, so by the time you get to front, all you have to do is scan and tap.
Do they not take cash in China?
Most merchants still take cash, but more and more do not. As cash users dwindle, it just isn't worth the hassle and risk for businesses to keep cash on hand. Any merchant can accept e-payments, even informal unregistered businesses. A farmer was selling apples out of a wagon on the street in front of my apartment ... with a WeChat QR-code sticker on his scale. Just weigh, scan, and go.
That part of the submission confused me - if payment is offered and If it’s the coin of the realm, how can they legally decline it? It’s not like “cashless” transactions aren’t using the same currency.
#DeleteChrome
I can just wave my phone? Do I have to flip it open, or can I leave it shut? And how do I pay to refill the phone with the phone?
Not sure about Sweden, but in the UK most places now do contactless EMV transactions with either a phone or a card. If you use a card, you just put it on the terminal and about a second later it beeps and it's done. If you use a phone, it's the same thing but you have to touch the fingerprint sensor as well (for Apple Pay, I've never seen anyone use Google Pay). I prefer to have a separate physical token that doesn't have the ability to run malware, so I don't use the phone, but with the card it takes less time than for cash:
My local convenience has self-service checkouts and it takes their UI a couple of seconds to step through the payment screen. I pop my card on the card reader before I tap the last step of the UI and it's done by the time I reach over to pick it up again.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
This is all great... once weâ(TM)re cashless youâ(TM)ll love the convenience of negative interest rates or addition transaction taxes or fees.
Iâ(TM)ve gone back to using cash. Itâ(TM)s really not that inconvenient. And if you choose human interaction instead of the checkout machines, not only will you be annoyed less by the irritating machine, youâ(TM)ll have time to pack your bag whilst somebody faster and more efficient scans it and have some fun calculating the perfect amount to get fewer coins back in your change. Oh, and a moment of human interaction.