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The concept of directly paying someone from your bank account seems completely impossible in America. There always has to be some middleman parasite- who conven
by AniseAbyss 5y ago
The concept of directly paying someone from your bank account seems completely impossible in America. There always has to be some middleman parasite- who conveniently charges a nice transaction fee for the privilege.
- ahefner 5y agoThe funny thing to me is that you can't always even pay money to the government itself without involving some middleman parasite that takes 1 or 2% for themselves.
- cuteboy19 5y agoA UPI like system would completely solve these problems.
- skeletal88 5y agoYes, why doesn't the US have something like our SEPA where we can just transfer money to someone's account?
- salawat 5y agoBecause the U.S. financial system, and access to it is a very powerful tool in terms of international diplomacy, and a crucial source of evidence/intelligence for law enforcement. Trivial abilities to move money around and an inability to lock out financial endpoints would completely neuter it's utility as sanctioning measure.
- patio11 5y agoThe payment volume over Zelle, which is instantaneous, free, bank-to-bank transfers, was about $307 billion in 2020. For ACH transactions, it was about $62 trillion (not a typo). Wire transfers are also a thing. So are, for that matter, checks, which by ancient custom are free for all parties but the banks (at least for retail users). That the payment industry exists when all of the above is true is a fascinating topic. I should probably cover it in a newsletter sometime.