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Swedes rebelling against a cashless society (2018)
- notRobot 7y agoBeing able to pay through cards and phones is super convenient, but cash should never not be an option. Card companies, payment apps and banks are constantly tracking your purchases and profiling you. This data can be leaked/stolen/sold, and is always available to governments and those in/with power. Cash is (almost completely) anonymous. You should always be able to pay with cash if you want.
- jamesblonde 7y agoThat article is out of date. In large parts of central Stockholm, you can't pay by cash. Legal tender is just words, if they don't take cash there's not much you can do.
- reaperducer 7y agoSo how do poor people function in a cashless society?
- username90 7y agoThey have bank accounts and debit cards like everyone else? In Sweden everyone can get Visa and Mastercard debit cards so you can even do internet purchases everywhere with them. If you mean how they transfer money between each other, they just use smart phones and Swish. Beggars even ask for money that way.
- bryanrasmussen 7y agoAnd when you lose your card because you have a problem keeping track of physical objects do you then just go to the bank and they use the card replacing machine to issue you a new one right on the spot? That's pretty cool, I wish we had something like that here in Denmark because wow, I lose my card a lot and I have to go weeks without one. One time I lost my card, ordered a new one, the card arrived but the pin code didn't arrive, so I waited an extra 4 days for it, and called up and they said sometimes that happens and then they sent me a new one, which meant I went essentially 24 days without a card. As far as phones go, so if your phone goes out, gets lost, gets stolen, breaks you have no money because money is tightly bound to your phone. I have a difficult time respecting the architectural decisions that have been made in this new implementation of money.
- username90 7y agoIf you really lose your card that often why don't you just order two to begin with? You'd have to take precautions like this even with normal money, since if you misplaced your monthly allowance you'd still be out for several weeks.
- bryanrasmussen 7y agoI guess I never thought about ordering two cards, probably like most people I like to think it won't happen again. If I am using cash I don't carry all the cash available to me all the time, so if I lose some cash it is not quite the same as losing my method of accessing money.
- kuschku 7y agoBecause that’s not possible – you can’t have multiple cards with the same name on the same account. I know, I’ve tried after I’ve spent the entirety of january without without a card due to losing one (and the bank fucking up the replacement).
- username90 7y agoMy bank lets me do that, not sure why your bank wouldn't let you. Also these aren't really problems with a cashless society, they are problems with a partially cashless society. Society will fix these issues very quickly when there are no workarounds, like making sure that everyone can have backup cards for example.
- Mirioron 7y agoI don't believe that they'll get fixed. It'll just be filed under "huh, that's terrible!"
- 2rsf 7y agoorder an extra credit card, never use it and store it someplace safe
- kzrdude 7y ago> everyone This is unfortunately not true, because you need a personal number to have a bank account.
- 2rsf 7y agoI'm not sure it is legally true, although I have heard it is in reality
- johnlorentzson 7y agoSwish and its identification system "Bank ID" are both owned and operated by for-profit companies. The clients only run on certain operating systems and they're actively preventing custom clients. An app on your phone is not an alternative to handing a bill to someone.
- occz 7y agoWell, they get a bank account and a debit card connected to that account. It's usually free/very cheap in Sweden. As far as I understand it, the 'underbanked'-situation present in the U.S. for poor people is not present in Sweden.
- concerned_user 7y agoIn europe in general debit accounts for residents are either free or very cheap, now if you are not a resident that is different story.
- hocuspocus 7y agoAlso people receiving any kind of welfare benefits in Europe need a bank account, there's no way they are unbanked.
- tedeh 7y agoA bank account is a right for every EU citizen: https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/financial-products-and-services/bank-accounts-eu/index_en.htm https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/financial-pr... Banks are not allowed to refuse account opening to any resident.
- jussij 7y agoFrom your link: > In some EU countries, your bank might still charge you an annual fee for this basic payment account. This fee should remain reasonable. For someone who is really poor, that annual account keeping fee is a much bigger hit to their pocket when compared to others not doing it so tough.
- username90 7y agoIt is around $20 a year, there are no people poor enough for that to be an issue in Europe.
- throwaway99674 7y agoBelieve me, there are people in Europe for who paying 20€ extra can be an issue. Even worse: unexpectedly having to pay 20€. Source: been there, done that.
- theshrike79 7y agoIt's not an unexpected 20€, more like 1-2 euros a month. Every month. At the same time.
- Mirioron 7y agoMinimum wage in Bulgaria (part of the EU) is €3,743 per year. Now imagine someone that's not full-time employed. €20 for them is not nothing. For them that would be the equivalent of someone earning $100k a year having to pay $500 to have a bank account. Note that often these low income accounts also have to pay when doing (some) transactions.
- dehrmann 7y agoIn Stockholm, I'd mostly be curious what the Romani do.
- kungtotte 7y agoGo to any number of places that still accept cash? Our major grocery store chains all still accept cash (ICA, Coop, Willys, Hemköp etc.) and at least ICA and Coop sells pretty much -everything- at their larger stores. They don't sell mattresses or furniture I guess, but you can go there with enough money and come out fully equipped to go camping for example. IKEA also accepts cash still, so you can buy your furniture there. Or even go get a nice meal there; a plate of meatballs and mashed potatoes costs 39 SEK (~3.7€, $4.1 USD). A BigMac&Co costs twice as much as a frame of reference. I (a Swede) am able to use cash every single day, and it's not an effort to do so.
- 2rsf 7y agoI guess you live near an IKEA store then. To get to IKEA and buy furniture you'll need to top up your SL card using card. In rural ("rural" meaning an hour commute from Stockholm) you'll find it even harder to get and use cash.
- kungtotte 7y agoI actually live 90 minutes outside Stockholm, going by public transport. According to https://sl.se https://sl.se it would take me 2 hours to IKEA Kungens Kurva. It's trivial to both get and use cash here.
- anonymou2 7y agoThey are discriminated against even more for the convenience of the rich.
- throw_543556 7y agoIn China, street beggars will have a sign with their QR code so you can donate to them electronically.
- willvarfar 7y agoThe article starts by using a part of central Stockholm as an example of a place where you can't pay by cash. How is it out of date?
- dehrmann 7y ago> Being able to pay through cards and phones is super convenient I was very impressed by Sydney's train between the airport and city that can take assorted contactless payments at the turnstile. None of this figuring out how many zones I need a ticket for or buying a $20 card and only using $9.50.
- lkramer 7y agoThe London Underground has the same thing. It will automatically calculate what you pay based on how many journeys and what zones you travel within, using either a dedicated card or contactless.
- Symbiote 7y agoLondon has had that for years now (rolled out 2012-2014), but I was particularly impressed to see a similar system on the buses in Belgrade.
- techsupporter 7y ago> You should always be able to pay with cash if you want. Why, other than your privacy? If I own a business, why should I be barred from choosing to not accept cash? Paper money is more labor-intensive to handle and opens my employees up to risk of being robbed for that cash or sickened by handling dirty bills. As for people who may not be able to pay electronically, why can I not choose to not have them as customers? If your argument is “because social good and we make those kinds of requirements on businesses all of the time,” I’m open to it but feel it goes much farther than privacy.
- onion2k 7y agoWhy, other than your privacy? Businesses that don't accept cash don't make any money when the infrastructure fails. If your revenue is dependent on your PoS device, Wi-Fi, ISP, payment provider, the payment provider's network infrastructure, banking network, and more that's a lot of risk. For most independent businesses having a working cash register and a bank account that enables cash deposits would be a better option than the cost of SLAs and insurance against not being open.
- yellow_postit 7y agoStoring carbon copies of credit cards is something still supported for when the network goes down, see “credit card imprinter”
- onion2k 7y agoThat depends on where you live.
- _Microft 7y agoThanks for this bit of information, now the raised print on credit cards finally makes sense.
- C1sc0cat 7y agoSo Sweden has gone almost cashless but they still have a manual process relying on embossed numbers? In the UK embossed numbers on cards are gone now
- aglavine 7y agoDon't know why an option of both anonymity and cashless isn't possible. Why couldn't a virtual wallet with just a fake name and a password exists?
- zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 7y agoPseudonymity is not anonymity. Your legal name is not really the most interesting aspect of your identity.
- aglavine 7y agoI agree, yet you can still hide most of the info with stuff like P2P transactions or encrypted transaction storage.
- willvarfar 7y agoIts a bold headline, but as the article explains, its not actually very many Swedes who seem to be 'rebelling'. People I know are trying to get pensioners they are 'responsible for' to stop carrying and using cash, as its far higher risk. I don't personally know of anybody rebelling against the cashless society, not in any age group. Its not even talked about. On the other hand, 'do you take swish' (a phone-to-phone payment method) is asked all the time. Lunch with friends? Instead of everyone ordering separately, just order together, and divvy it up with Swish when you get the bill. Etc. I have a single banknote folded up my wallet, just for emergencies, and I haven't used it this year yet.
- dehrmann 7y agoIn my time in Stockholm, I think I went to two places that were cash-only. One was a gelato shop(?!), the other a shop selling old maps and lithographs run by an older man. Literally everywhere else happily takes cards.
- Svip 7y ago> I don't personally know of anybody rebelling against the cashless society, not in any age group. Its not even talked about. No one is, because the cashless society isn't happening. The concept of abandoning cash is at this stage merely a thought experiment. Even in Sweden, the most significant action taken in that direction is a discussion about whether to have a discussion, from the government. But why would any government abandon cash? Any fiat currency needs at least some cash to go around, otherwise the remaining cash exchanges that still happens, a lot of which are untracked, would be outside of the control that governments still have over them; valuation. If you take away their cash, they will simply find another bartering tool.
- jopsen 7y agoYou're right that if you take away cash the sketchy side of the economy might switch to euros or dollar :) But that won't work for shops trying to avoid taxes. It'll also make it much harder to buy stuff from criminals, as you would have to go get cash somewhere. What other cash exchanges still happens?
- LessDmesg 7y agoAnd when the (broke) Swedish government raises taxes sky-high, they will all flock to cash, gold, bitcoin and other off-the-radar payment methods.
- tonyedgecombe 7y agoGovernment debt as a percentage of GDP is very low in Sweden: https://tradingeconomics.com/country-list/government-debt-to-gdp https://tradingeconomics.com/country-list/government-debt-to...
- bjelkeman-again 7y agoYep. Sweden’s debt per citizen is about $10k. Compared to US debt per citizen which is $86k [1] https://www.finansportalen.se/sverigesekonomi/ https://www.finansportalen.se/sverigesekonomi/ [2] http://www.theusdebtclock.com/ http://www.theusdebtclock.com/
- LessDmesg 7y agoThe thing about Swedish debt is that it's largely local than national: https://www.scb.se/en/finding-statistics/statistics-by-subject-area/financial-markets/financial-accounts/financial-accounts-quarterly-and-annual/pong/statistical-news/-financial-accounts-third-quarter-2018/ https://www.scb.se/en/finding-statistics/statistics-by-subje...
- tonyedgecombe 7y agoThose figures I linked to don’t distinguish between local and national debt.
- username90 7y agoSweden have high taxes so the government have lots of money, why would they be broke?
- parski 7y agoIf the Swedish government was broke it would still have access to universal healthcare and a free first class education.
- dehrmann 7y agoPart of why cashless works is the same reason the Swedish welfare state generally works: a trust of government. Contrast this with Germany and its history with...lists; it's best not to have yourself be too traceable. I think the US is somewhere in-between, but at the end of the day, we'll hand over a lot for 2% cashback and avoid paying for journalism at all costs.
- LatteLazy 7y agoOf course, the German government that made lists did so without credit card records or electronic ids or anything like that...
- ColanR 7y agoAnd just think what they could have accomplished if that modern tech had existed.
- ce4 7y agoThis misses the point - the spying-on-your-citizens was decided by the state on purpose, going completely cashless enables dragnet surveillance that makes it really hard to evade if one has to (journalists, dissidents)
- LatteLazy 7y agoOh, I was just answering the German comparison. I agree that mass surveillance is a terrible idea and is incomparable with democracy.
- theshrike79 7y agoIt wasn't fully manual: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust
- johnlorentzson 7y agoI never thought I'd see "IBM" and "holocaust" in the same sentence, but here I am.
- michaelmrose 7y agoIn a society where cash is an option there is a roof on how much money you can extract from the population as if you ask for too much people will increasingly avail themselves of cash. The cost of switching to using cash is a trip to the bank/atm. The closer you get to cashless the more you can afford to screw people to the wall. For example does anyone recall the idea us bankers floated about negative nominal interest on checking?
- nnq 7y agoCash in the only practical anonymous-when-you-need-it-to-be way to pay still. Don't let it die until we have alternative suitable anonymous and un-blockable-by-cyberattacks (eg. "it must still work while the internet is down") currencies! (Note: no, we don't have yet, all current crypto currencies are "barely working prototypes" at best, all of them have issues that still need ironing out! Bitcoin itself is like a proof-of-concept-pre-MVP that got "rushed into production". And the blockchain itself... we NEED to have a way of fully erasing history from it, like paper money do, we don't yet know how to do that while keeping the nice properties of blockchain... all these are open research questions, Satoshi only made the first baby step!)
- sgt 7y agoAgreed, I don't use a lot of cash but I do seriously appreciate that it exists. And although infrastructure is robust, it won't be in a crisis or a war situation. Even in Sweden you could look at days, weeks, months without Internet and connectivity if something serious should happen.
- DarthGhandi 7y agoWho are you quoting here?
- teddyh 7y agoItalics without quotation marks and not prefixed with > are usually simply for emphasis, not quoting.
- eitland 7y agoIn Norway, next to Sweden, accepting cash is mandatory and you can get fined (after a warning it seems) if you don't. The reasoning is we don't want everything to break down just because the power grid or backbone networks breaks down.
- ptr 7y agoUnfortunately a lot of things tend to break down anyway when the power is gone: doors won't open, PoS machines won't work, etc. What might work is actually cell phone payments due to the towers having power backup.
- johnlorentzson 7y agoLooks like I know where I'm going if Sweden turns to shit.
- eitland 7y agoBTW: I often look at profiles on HN.
- alkonaut 7y agoWe aren’t (Weren’t) rebelling. There isn’t even a debate about it. I still haven’t used cash in years. Certainly not since the 2018 of the article. We really need “digital cash”, ie a government backed digital currency that can be used with the convenience of cards but with the anonymity (at the point of sale) of cash. I don’t believe in regular non-state cryptocurrencies for various reasons, not least because anonymity of all transactions isn’t really desirable in a high tax welfare state with high trust that people pay taxes. The Swedish central back is working on it, so maybe this is not too far away. One should be aware though that “digital cash“ doesn’t solve all the problems, it’s not as resilient technically as paper cash.
- darkFunction 7y agoCashless is a dream for government because they can switch the populace to a negative interest rate.
- codr7 7y agoI recently moved back to Sweden after living 4 years in Germany. I don't have any cards, and I don't carry a "smart"phone anymore; in Germany this didn't cause any trouble at all and I was far from alone. Much of the current Swedish society is currently closed to me, I know of three shops and one cafe in the (200k people) city center that accept cash. Some of it has been gradual but it changed dramatically during the time I was away. Believe me, this is not the kind of world anyone really wants to live in. It's all very convenient until the crap hits the fan, putting this much power in the hands of any authority is a recipe for disaster. Not to mention those who have no choice.
- Svoka 7y agoMysterious crap hitting the fan. You accepted authority when started using money. Barter is the way. Only reason to keep cash IMO is for accessibility.
- codr7 7y agoMysterious? You should read up on your history. Some authority, not the absolute surveillance and control this path leads to.
- malloryerik 7y ago> Barter is the way. Umm, could you explain how this would work? Money has typically emerged as a "universal barter," like gold or tobacco (in colonial Virginia for ex.) or cigarettes in prisons that can be exchanged for anything in the assumption that they will always be in demand. So I can trade you gold for your sysadmin work (simply indirect "barter") and you can trade the gold for drinks at night, breakfast cereal, a NYTimes.com subscription, etc. But you can't trade your sysadmin work for any of those because it can't be divided up like that. So whenever you try to have a direct barter system you'll just end up with some kind of money by necessity, maybe gold, silver, seashells, etc. It's merely a higher abstraction on top of the barter, thus "universal barter." And indeed for the NYTimes sub you'll need some kind of e-gold... Money can be stored to use later but its value is always based on the current amount of money in use and the current amount of goods and potential services/labor. Hoarding it in Smaug's lair under Lonely Mountain is bad not because Smaug is thus in the wealthiest 0.00001% of inhabitants of Middle Earth (meaningless since he doesn't actually use the money) but because by removing the supply of money he has been creating deflation and is thereby depressing economic activity. Decreasing the supply of money means falling prices (because there's less exchange-medium, not because there's more production) means debts are harder to pay back, ppl hoard what's left and the dour mood discourages future economic activity. When Bilbo frees the hoard there will be massive inflation but also a burst of economic activity (i.e., work). It's true that with only direct barter there would be no problems (or benefits) from increasing or decreasing the money supply, but you'd have much bigger problems. Remember that money is not itself value but merely a means of exchange, one way to measure value, and storing that money is a way to make a future claim on an amount of future value. Economists are simplifying when they say that money is a "store of value." You're actually just storing a claim on future value. How much value? However much you can get for that amount of money at the moment someone trades you something for it and regardless of the value when you initially stored it. "Modern" paper money, "reserve notes" used in lieu of the notes' corresponding gold or silver stored for example at a goldsmith, was quickly abused as the reserve keepers learned that they could lend more notes than they had metal, thus creating a kind of virtual store of money (or if money is economic RAM, virtual RAM?), and what might have started as a kind of scam was soon recognized as a great boon because the money supply could expand when there was an opportunity for increased work/production of value and shrink back down if and as the opportunity came to a close. Of course this credit money system a.k.a. Our World has perils and requires constant maintenance and repair but without it we'd be far worse off, more unequal, less healthy, more wretched and to return to your original point, we'd most likely be controlled by more direct and onerous authorities. And with just direct barter we'd be in... the stone age?
- INTPenis 7y agoNot may, has caused. I've seen it myself. On the plus side the app StreetComplete has merged in a quest that allows people to easily answer whether a business in Sweden accepts cash or not. So hopefully that will improve the poor OSM data set and allow people to easier find cash payment places. For the nerds out there it uses the OSM tag payment:cash=yes.
- 0x1221 7y agoMaybe I'm biased but I much prefer the way the UK has handled this. Card payments are everywhere, contactless payments are everywhere (life changer in London's public transport where touching in and out with your phone/card automatically charges you the correct price meaning that you don't need to deal with tickets) and everyone still has the option to use cash.
- johnlorentzson 7y agoI'm Swedish and this stuff makes me really worried. Especially since the main way for two people to exchange small amounts of money is through a proprietary app that uses a proprietary ID system (owned by a for-profit company) that only runs on iOS, Android, Windows and Mac. I really hope this trend dies off, a cash-less society is a terrible idea. I will say, however, that buses not taking cash is perfectly fine. They use NFC/RFID ticket cards which can't identify you. Not being able to buy tickets with cash is a little less fine.
- dtech 7y agoYou will always have vendor neutral payments with bank transactions, which are EU wide and regulated with SEPA. Don't know about Sweden, but in the Netherlands that's widely supported and free for consumers. What's the harm in people using a proprietary app on top of that that has slightly more convenience?
- johnlorentzson 7y agoBecause it's become a standard that almost everyone is expected to use.
- tyfon 7y agoWe got a system in Norway called Vipps for small transactions that I refuse to take part in but it seems like 99% of the rest of the population are using it. I've yet to have anyone refuse to pay me via direct bank transfer or me paying them in this way when I ask and explain why I don't use Vipps.
- 2rsf 7y ago> explain why I don't use Vipps please explain. direct bank transfers are still slow (same bank) to unacceptable (different banks) for most payments
- 7y ago
- throw_543556 7y agoHow do tourists pay for things in Sweden? Especially smaller value things. One of the most inconvenient aspects about visiting China is paying for small things. Large department stores and high end restaurants will accept foreign credit cards, but mom and pop stores don’t. While most still accept cash, sometimes the smaller stores or street vendors won’t have enough for change and you have to wait for them to get it. A few times I even got a discount when they couldn’t give me exact change. I installed WeChat and AliPay last time I visited, but the payments don’t work if you don’t have a local number, ID, or bank account.
- alltakendamned 7y agoMastercard and Visa are the most common ones here, most probably a tourists credit or debit card will support the same payment networks.
- onuban 7y agoHow can you have a cashless society if I have to enter the pin every time I use my card? During my last trip to Stockholm using cards was more of a hassle than using cash. London/UK is more of cashless society than Stockholm/Sweden.
- alltakendamned 7y agoOnly for transactions over 200 SEK really if you pay contactless. Also, there's always a trade off between security and usability, so I'm happy to enter my PIN.
- rags2riches 7y agoMany stores don't require a pin for smaller amounts. With NFC cards it's really quite quick to pay. I think the deal is that the store, not the payment processor, eats the cost when a stolen card is used without a pin. But the increased turnover is probably worth it in many cases. Edit: Maybe they also require a pin for foreign cards when they wouldn't for a local? Just a guess though.
- quijoteuni 7y agoThere is a world trend to criticise skandinavia (Scandinavian countries are always in the top 10 of best places to live) . The BBC has been for the last 10 years an awful source of it. The hit Scandinavia to divert attention of their own problems. EVVERYTHING they criticise is worst in the UK.
- fierarul 7y agoExcerpts from the 2022 Chairman of Harmony answer regarding the Holy See rejection of the Panda chip: "It is a common misconception that the so called 'Mark of the Beast' chip has anything to do with money. The Panda chip is nothing more than a pandemic health and contact tracing beacon." "Because the chip is always available and very secure, a lot of the citizens do choose to use it for payments." "We find the ideas surrounding cash obsolete. All cash is uniquely identifiable and most major stores just destroy received cash for sanitary reasons and print cash on demand for change." "Regarding precious metal purchases, the Government does allow purchase, except gold which is required to manufacture the Panda chip and related accessories".
- pritovido 7y agoI am from Spain, and today the people in power there are socialistic(psoe) and communist(podemos),the last one friends and money receivers from Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, Iran and Cuba. I attended a talk in the past("Know your enemy") when they defended and wanted to collect money and people for helping Colombia's FARC. Those guys want to destroy democracy from democracy, just like Hitler, Mussolini or Chavez. The last thing you want to do is give a Government like this all the information of all transactions made by the people in the country. And that is exactly what "cash free" means. In countries like the US the mechanism of control of political power by people are more powerful, but even there companies control and concentration of information is too high(Americans distrust Government but trust companies) for a healthy system.
- socialdemocrat 7y agoI am Norwegian and we seldom use cash as well. I use cash perhaps a couple of times per year. However I am totally against the reliance on electronic payment. Cash should alway be a viable option. Or at least the electronic payment systems we use need to be more robust. I remember from living in the Netherlands that they had a neat system called Chipknip. It was electronic money. So the machines accepting it did not rely on having a direct connection to a bank at all times. It think if we are to be cashless we need something like that. It needs to be possible to make payments without having a physical connection to a bank at all times. A big problem with electronic payment is that we are handing over a huge amount of cash to companies like VISA and Mastercard. I think when all of society operates in this fashion there really is a need for a government supported solution, because this is not merely a question of a "neat" feature you can buy but essential infrastructure in society. It is reckless to leave such essential infrastructure in the hands of private companies.
- kome 7y agofully agree! but i push it even further: i'm for electronic cash, but i'm against some american company (visa, mastercard) to know every transaction of mine. I want public electronic cash. A public, national, non for profit infrastructure that manage cash.
- digestiv3 7y agoA lot of the comments to this post talks about the dangers with a cashless society in terms of giving up the right to privacy. While that might be true right now one must remember that the technological advances of cashless payments are very new and we must work towards a cashless payment solution that can meet the privacy needs that cash provides. Saying that "you should always be able to pay with cash if you want" sounds technophobic.
- JoeAltmaier 7y agoIn the US, cash money is enshrined in the Constitution. It'll take a significant act of Congress to change that. So a long history of cash as a civil right.
- digestiv3 7y agoThat is true for many technological advances when faced with dated legislation. "Written in stone" is a very poor saying since the collective understanding changes with time. Conservativism does not play well with the rapid technological advances made each year.
- zoomablemind 7y agoThe convenience of electronic payments is obvious. But cashless sounds more like a restriction, indeed inconvenience. Say, one lost a wallet and phone (robbed or just that, lost) and needs to get back home somehow. Public transportation requires an electronic ticket, cab needs card. What's then? Walk to your bank branch, explain to driver the story and pay later, hope a compelled passenger would pay for you? Lending someone a dollar does not oblige one whether you trust the person on not. Paying for one directly is more involved. Surely people don't lend their cards to strangers, willfully.
- ryuukk_ 7y agoif you lost your wallet, you lost your paper money too
- digestiv3 7y agoHere is a radical idea: what if everyone paid their tickets through a public infrastructure tax. That way neither the person with cards or cash in their wallets has to worry about getting home. We don't even need to carry a wallet that could get lost in the first place!
- zoomablemind 7y agoIn many European cities transportation is on honor basis, that is you're assumed to have paid the ticket, unlike elsewhere to pay on entry. But this is paired with random control runs and stiff penalties. I would imagine one could just take a free ride, and prepare to tell the story if caught. Or maybe even go to police, report a loss, maybe get some means to get home. Well, it's like a society contract. Looks like it has some small font on it too :) This changes the notion of money, turning it more into rationning system. Cashless seems almost a step away from social credit system. You can get your "allocated share". What does it mean to be a run-away in Sweden? Is it walk-away, hide-away, certainly not cashless...
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- MperorM 7y agoAs a student who recently spent their savings on a Macbook 16 inch, just to have it stolen shortly after I really would have preferred selling it for cash would not have been an option for the thiefs. in the same manner, I gladly would have accepted mass surveillance if it meant the thief would actually get caught.
- qwerty456127 7y agoA cashless society is a step on the way to communism. Whatever you think about communism (fear it or want it). Whoever doesn't want communism (which is much more likely to be a dystopia than an utopia) should defend cash to the death.
- aabbcc1241 7y agoWhy put all eggs in a single bucket?