Topic: China Can’t Afford a Cashless Society (Perhaps No One Can) - page 2. (Read 409 times)

Cashless society soon or later will happen. Information technology including internet user growing very fast and peoples can use internet making transaction more faster and easier. I am believe in next 5 years, people will not using paper money for their transaction anymore except in place without internet connection

The link you posted explicitly states "85% of sweden's population has access to electronic banking".

This means: 15% of sweden's unbanked demographic will suffer if a cashless society is implemented.

I would be curious to know, what part of this is a "conspiracy".  

Imagine there is an island city with two bridges. One bridge can be utilized by anyone as the cash/paper money bridge. The other bridge requires a bank account or access to electronic transactions to use. The owners of the electronic transaction bridge want to shut down the cash/paper money bridge so everyone is forced to use the bridge they themselves own & have control over. This would grant them a monopoly or centralized market which they could then leverage for their own gain. It is a good move for the owners of the single bridge, for everyone else is it likely a bad arrangement.

When in human history has a monopoly or single option ever been preferable to having multiple options? From this precedent alone it might be derived that having less options translates to increased suffering due to the higher potential for abuse and exploitation. That appears the rational and natural precedent which can be projected from known circumstances. Feel free to share your own conclusions.

Yeah, Sweden has also been running into such problems, as stompix mentioned. I don't even think it's the government's fault. I mean, the infrastructure is there, which is why they've been having problems in the first place. It's just that not everyone is ready for it yet.

What's interesting is that Bitcoin is always being touted as a way to increase financial inclusion, when technology itself can mean a higher barrier of entry, as these situations have shown. I do think that's going to change in the near future with people getting more used to technology, but the poor will need to be able to afford these tools themselves all the same. It's going to be interesting watching these cashless societies go, because their situation might mirror Bitcoin's future.

So, everybody is suffering in Sweden? Are they seeing a diminishing GDP, less spending?
Not from what I'm reading.

And furthermore, there was no government involvement in this trend, and the ones you claim are the responsible for this are actually against it:

People in Sweden barely use cash — and that’s sounding alarm bells for the country's central bank

Really, lately, you've gone back to your old habit of seeing conspiracies everywhere!!



I think not only merchants but the cashiers are also happy...
You just tell the client what to pay and wait for him to use his cards, no more counting notes, no more double checking what he gave you, no more arguing "I gave you a 20!" , and you're safe from paying a simple mistake out of your own pocket at the end of the day.

Personally, If I would have to count bills 8 hours day I would go nuts after a week...

This is basically what I had said, because most people like the convenience of some kind of card to make their payment. Gone are the days when you had a wallet that you cannot close, due to all the small change and also the "dirty" stripper notes. 

When there was a Ebola outbreak, people died because it was rumored that people were infected by the cash that they stole from the dead bodies or from their houses. They simply could not burn good money. 

Add to that the countless in-store cards that are being issued and you have a perfect environment where cash is not being used anymore.

I think there's a misconception present where people assume a cashless society is a natural and inevitable progression. Eliminating paper money in favor of cashless electronic transactions further centralizes currencies leaving consumers, businesses and individuals with fewer options. This reduction in options is correlated with reduced financial efficiency and reduced effectiveness in terms of spending. Over the long term this results in decreased GDP, reduced economic growth and other negative trends.

Some in the financial world push for a cashless society as it would centralize currency transactions in their favor. Eliminating competition between electronic transactions and paper transactions would create something further resembling a monopoly which would make it easier to exploit and take advantage of consumers. I think its safe to say a cashless society would only benefit less than 1% of the population. Everyone else would suffer as a result of cashlessness.

And so there's no reason to support it.

Perhaps, the crimes nor money laundering can be lessen if we all in using banks in every transactions that we had. Since banks requires a lot of verification before you create a new account, people with evil plan will think twice to continue what their plan. Though, there's black market that obviously continuing ruin the system.

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More likely no one can do that even a more develop country as goingng cashless is not easy as what we think since we should be considering a lot of aspects and surely government will be having hard time to convince everyone to cooperate especially those in remote areas. In an instance, we're like 30% cashless by using cards and online payment.

Its isnt new. The world has been already moving towards a cashless society since Diner's Club introduced the first credit card in 1950. Credit card transactions might also already be composed of more than 40% of all the world's transactions, but I would like to see a citation if someone else can post it lol.

Every country will not become a cashless society, we used to live with it and cash is supported by the government. We should also consider those people who don’t know cryptocurrency or those who don’t want to use this technology. This is too good to be true, even in the next 15years.

I am sure that it is impossible to realize a cashless society because the world is not ready for that. Your look is focused on the crypto technologies and I suppose that you want a cashless society to be true but nothing is ready for that. I mean that it need to change the world financial system, the world economy, economy of all countries, people's mind and so on. It is impossible to do even in the far future and moreover there are no such intentions among the elites who govern the world. So I am sure that it is too early to speak about the world wide cashless socity.
I think that the most important troubles are to eliminate fraud from the crypto market that people will be able to trust the crypto market and to use crypto technologies more widely.

I don't think China's decision on it's approach to digital currency would be deterministic for the rest of the world.

the problem here is there is a paradigm shift in the consumer economy, and that shift includes new barriers to entry. traditional cash-based economies don't shut out the unbanked poor---even homeless beggars on the streets can bring their change into a shop and pay for their dinner. that fundamentally changes when cashless payment systems like Alipay require formal enrollment with banks. 200 million+ unbanked is a lot of people. then you have to consider the technology barrier for older generations. i know my grandparents have always carried around cash---everything they do is cash. i wonder how they would fare in this situation, where businesses are actually refusing cash payments. the elderly aren't like kids; they won't pick up new technologies that easily.


i'm guessing they're too small to be relevant here. this seems like an issue primarily affecting the poor unbanked and the elderly---two groups i think aren't a big part of the bitcoin investor demographic.

Well, my bad I guess, but it's not obvious at all, especially when you clarified your point referring to governments (plural) - I took it as you switching to the general principles.
Not that it makes any difference. China is one of the best examples of quick transition from dirt poor country to relatively modern one. Saying that quote: "lower class in economical terms hasn't gone through any sort of improvement throughout the last decades" is simply wrong. Was the % of unbanked people few decades ago the same as it is today? If not, doesn't that show that huge number of lower class people actually experienced massive improvement (with big portion of them moving up from lower class)? Who do you think is responsible for that near 70% mobile transactions? Only rich and middle class?


External how? Your comfort of life is not like the weather that just happens, it is very much dictated by the political conditions you live in (compare China Vs. North Korea for example).


If those ~200 millions of unbanked Chinese are result of banks refusing them as customers - then yes, government should step in. If they're unbanked because they choose to be this way - then let them be, their children/grandchildren will progressively become more open to the new tech and problem will resolve itself.

I think the problem is not cryptocurrency. The government can also make their currency become a digital currency and this is quite easy to do, and until now every community often uses a digital transaction system through their credit cards. And I see the benefits of the government when focusing the payment system into digital, one of which is that each transaction can be easily tracked by the government, in contrast to paper money, every person can make transactions in secret. The second advantage is that the government can easily monitor the circulation of money in the country.

I think a global epidemic has been the increase use of alternatives to cash. Merchants is starting to see the advantages of not having to deal with "dirty" paper money and having the higher risk of robberies when you have to collect a large amount of cash.

It is just more convenient and hygienic and safe to use alternative digital currencies and digital payment networks over cash. The informal sector will not have a problem with cash, because they collect much less than the larger retailers. Counterfeit fiat currencies also adds more cost to their business to detect that and also to prevent that. 

We are quickly moving towards a cashless society. 

change doesn't really happen faster than you can imagine but it has to start somewhere maybe in just a small city where they can start being cashless. i think there was already a cashless city, i remember there were news about a city in sweden. i'm just not sure which one. it really has to start somewhere until the mass adoption happen.

So good and i add comment. China is a socialist country, so there will always be rich and poor in this society. There is clearly visible difference between the classes. In a non-cash society, generally speaking, all 100% of the money will belong to the state (Bank), because they will temporarily issue a cash issue on request from a credit or debit card.
As for the Cryptocurrency, then the money does not belong to the state or the Bank, money from other people.
Example, in Germany almost (approximately) 80% of all money transactions are made by non-cash method. What not I'd say for other countries.

I think that the lack of paper money, this is a contrived problem. For each state it is not a big problem to include a printing press and additionally print a certain amount of paper money.
As for the transition to non-cash forms of settlements, our society is not yet ready to fully transfer to them. This is a long process, however, in my opinion, our society will never become non-cash. In any case, this will not happen in the near future. Cash is indispensable in many life situations.

Paper money shortage? The article was telling a story on how a growing % of people dont want paper money anymore because they would like to use electronic payments more. This is making a sector in China's society worry because the older generation and the low income sector do not have access to online and electronic payments. Its making them hard to transact with the use if cash. Theres no paper money shortage.

In my opinion, in the society there should be a certain balance of cash, non-cash settlements and circulation of the crypto currency. Of course, they will not exist in an equal percentage, each kind of money must take its place in society and all of them must walk in parallel with each other. Life exists in very diverse manifestations and every manifestation of it requires its own approach and its own, individual solution. No type of money in the end will not completely replace other types of money. A certain type of money can prevail, but not their other kinds.