4 ms·

Without State intervention there's nothing stopping businesses colluding to all go cashless. Or... all together do something else that's bad for us. Or monopoli

Without State intervention there's nothing stopping businesses colluding to all go cashless. Or... all together do something else that's bad for us. Or monopolizing. The strong enough reason is "it's better for the people." It's easy how we decide whose preferences we mandate - we mandate people's preferences, and businesses find ways to make money within those constraints. There's no issue making profit like this, so I'm not sure where the concern is. Profits slightly dented for a second? Oh well.

Ferret7446 3y ago
There is, it's called starting your own business. And the only thing stopping that is... state intervention.
- dwb 3y ago
  That might solve it for the one business “you” start. It doesn’t address the collusion of everyone else, does it?
maximilianroos 3y ago
Right, no one is rejecting the notion of regulation. But personal preferences are a bad way to choose regulation — businesses can aggregate preferences much better than the state can.
- bigtunacan 3y ago
  It isn't about preference. It's well understood that refusing cash payments has an outsized impact on both the impoverished and underrepresented classes. One easy way to keep the homeless from coming in to make purchases is to refuse cash payments. The government's job isn't to cater to business preferences it is to look out for the well-being of the people.
  - robertlagrant 3y ago
    > The government's job isn't to cater to business preferences it is to look out for the well-being of the people. Businesses are also run by people. Everything is people. The difference here is the government wants to impose cost on businesses to solve problems it should be solving. It could solve them by issuing every homeless person with a credit card that gets topped up by X a month. It would rather just write a rule, take the credit, and have someone else pay all the costs.
    - LocalH 3y ago
      > The difference here is the government wants to impose cost on businesses to solve problems it should be solving. Handling cash has been an accepted cost of business for over a century, but now it’s somehow an undue burden to continue doing so? Hogwash. > It could solve them by issuing every homeless person with a credit card that gets topped up by X a month. That sounds like a solution in search of a problem. Good luck at getting something like that implemented in the US.
      - robertlagrant 3y ago
        > Handling cash has been an accepted cost of business for over a century, but now it’s somehow an undue burden to continue doing so? Hogwash. Handling cash is a big cost. You have to store it, get it moved in and out, stop people stealing it, be insured against people stealing it, count it, make sure you have change available, etc etc. Yes people did it, and cash used to get stolen more. More importantly, this isn't about the cost of cash. It's the mandatory of adding this cost in to businesses that don't want to pay all that money to handle money. > That sounds like a solution in search of a problem. It's a solution to a very specific problem: cashless shops.
        komali2 3y ago
        > It's a solution to a very specific problem: cashless shops. Why should the government be responsible for building out an incredible infrastructure project so that some businesses don't have to worry about handling cash? Cash is not a new concept, we've been using it since the inception of the nation. Suddenly some businesses find a way to save a buck by not handling it, but this also happens to segregate a portion of Americans, but oh well that's not their fault, if the government doesn't like businesses doing segregation, the government can just become a bank? And issues cards? Nah. In the USA if you want to do business you need to manage and handle cash. That's a perfectly reasonable expectation. Cost of doing business. You also have to track your revenue and file taxes. That's perfectly reasonable as well, right? Or should the government be responsible for auditing every single company and managing their finances to determine how much tax is owed? I mean it would save the company money, right?
bagels 3y ago
Yeah, I wonder if the card processors have considered kickbacks to go cashless.
- robertlagrant 3y ago
  I wonder if security vans, safe vendors, permanent dye vendors, business insurance vendors have considered kickbacks to ban cashless.

Ferret7446 3y ago

There is, it's called starting your own business. And the only thing stopping that is... state intervention.

dwb 3y ago
That might solve it for the one business “you” start. It doesn’t address the collusion of everyone else, does it?

maximilianroos 3y ago

Right, no one is rejecting the notion of regulation. But personal preferences are a bad way to choose regulation — businesses can aggregate preferences much better than the state can.

bigtunacan 3y ago
It isn't about preference. It's well understood that refusing cash payments has an outsized impact on both the impoverished and underrepresented classes. One easy way to keep the homeless from coming in to make purchases is to refuse cash payments. The government's job isn't to cater to business preferences it is to look out for the well-being of the people.
- robertlagrant 3y ago
  > The government's job isn't to cater to business preferences it is to look out for the well-being of the people. Businesses are also run by people. Everything is people. The difference here is the government wants to impose cost on businesses to solve problems it should be solving. It could solve them by issuing every homeless person with a credit card that gets topped up by X a month. It would rather just write a rule, take the credit, and have someone else pay all the costs.
  - LocalH 3y ago
    > The difference here is the government wants to impose cost on businesses to solve problems it should be solving. Handling cash has been an accepted cost of business for over a century, but now it’s somehow an undue burden to continue doing so? Hogwash. > It could solve them by issuing every homeless person with a credit card that gets topped up by X a month. That sounds like a solution in search of a problem. Good luck at getting something like that implemented in the US.
    - robertlagrant 3y ago
      > Handling cash has been an accepted cost of business for over a century, but now it’s somehow an undue burden to continue doing so? Hogwash. Handling cash is a big cost. You have to store it, get it moved in and out, stop people stealing it, be insured against people stealing it, count it, make sure you have change available, etc etc. Yes people did it, and cash used to get stolen more. More importantly, this isn't about the cost of cash. It's the mandatory of adding this cost in to businesses that don't want to pay all that money to handle money. > That sounds like a solution in search of a problem. It's a solution to a very specific problem: cashless shops.
      - komali2 3y ago
        > It's a solution to a very specific problem: cashless shops. Why should the government be responsible for building out an incredible infrastructure project so that some businesses don't have to worry about handling cash? Cash is not a new concept, we've been using it since the inception of the nation. Suddenly some businesses find a way to save a buck by not handling it, but this also happens to segregate a portion of Americans, but oh well that's not their fault, if the government doesn't like businesses doing segregation, the government can just become a bank? And issues cards? Nah. In the USA if you want to do business you need to manage and handle cash. That's a perfectly reasonable expectation. Cost of doing business. You also have to track your revenue and file taxes. That's perfectly reasonable as well, right? Or should the government be responsible for auditing every single company and managing their finances to determine how much tax is owed? I mean it would save the company money, right?

bagels 3y ago

Yeah, I wonder if the card processors have considered kickbacks to go cashless.

robertlagrant 3y ago
I wonder if security vans, safe vendors, permanent dye vendors, business insurance vendors have considered kickbacks to ban cashless.