Comment by kdinn | Hacker News Reader

Comment by kdinn | Hacker News Reader

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I'm interested to read the vast majority of comments being pro-cash with concerns over security or convenience.

I'm not sure where you all live, but as a counterpoint, I live in Australia and I don't use cash hardly at all any more. I don't even use cards, or take my wallet. If I have my phone on me I can charge anything to any of the 4 cards I have in my phone's wallet (also I can bring up my official Medicare card, drivers license, etc. on my phone). So whenever I go out I just grab my phone and keys.

Everywhere accepts this. Whether I'm paying for a coffee or a $2,000 TV, I just unlock my phone and tap it on a payment terminal. It takes literally a second. For larger purchases (over A$200) you have to enter a PIN.

I certainly wouldn't like to go back to carrying notes and coins around - making sure you have enough, handing it over, waiting for change to be organised (and waiting for them to do this with everyone before me).

Pretty much all establishments still take cash but I don't use it, and most of my friends are the same.

Yes that's all fine and good, but finance is at the heart of structured civilization, and we're note quite there yet with respect to open, transparent systems, that have privacy and resiliency.

The INTERAC network in Canada is owned by the banks and it's yet another 99% margin rake on small businesses. It's a game of leverage - the big chains can negotiate a deal, the smaller vendors are out.

The Canadian government just invoked a kind of 'Marshall Law' because protestors were honking horns and not moving. While I'm glad the Police moved them (and should have sooner), the fact is, personal financial bank accounts of individuals not very related to the transactions were shut down by the federal government.

A politicized situation should not allow for the cancellation of the flow of money, that should be strictly an issue of the justice system, and then, proportionately.

The thought that the gov, or a bank, or Amazon could stop me from giving someone $40 for almost whatever reason, is Orwellian.

All of our leaders relish, at least on some level, the opportunity for control - and I'm not being conspiratorial here, I do think that for now things are benign, but it takes the smallest 'problem' for things to go south.

I think we need a system that has privacy, that has no fees, and whereupon individuals cannot be 'de-banked' from the system in any way, i.e where it would take some act of interdictive oversight for the justice system, with a warrant, to get access to, or control some transactions (i.e. major drug bust, bribery, organized crime).

In effect: we need a 'digital cash' that's 'just like cash', meaning that it's open, anonymous, secure, maybe not very useful to transport large quantities, there's no arbitrary means of interdiction etc..

I'm pro-cash for the edge cases.

The vast majority of my transactions are done with credit cards. Contactless payment is quick and the points are nice. But when it comes to tipping people (yes, I live in America), shopping at immigrant grocery stores, or dining at mom & pop restaurants, I pay cash because it helps them out. Sure they're underreporting their revenue, but hardly to the degree that Fortune 500 companies are. I just hope my tea leaf salad money isn't being funneled back to Rohingya genocide.

Also, cash is great for those who have trouble budgeting or just barely make enough money. It's not uncommon for folks to take out their allowance for the week and only keep to spending that. A quick glance in the wallet gives you a very tangible and real account balance. Numbers in an app are too abstract.

If there's a time to invoke Chesterton's fence, it's definitely with regards to cash.

Morally and philosophically I agree with you! Cash needs to exist for personal liberties.

But I've been in the states for 7 years now and I can't think of one time I used cash when purchasing anything. Except the few times I picked something up from OfferUp (a palm tree, some other plants).

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