My bank is trying to become cashless and I'm so mad about it. (I am looking for a new bank)
Our society cannot be cashless.
Why?
Because to open a bank account you need to have a permanent address, specific ID, and other items that are unobtainable for certain people including the homeless/houseless/some "illegal" immigrants
Not everyone us comfortable using digital only, I know a few old people who don't like cards, I know people who budget by using physical cash, and some people just prefer cash.
Also a lot of kids still use physical money as an allowance (I work in a craft store and having a kid come up with what is obviously their allowance to buy themselves craft supplies is so wonderful)
But there's another side to it.
A lot of places have surcharges based on card usage. It's usually "under $X" but I've seen a few places that are like "there's just a surcharge on all card transactions" like -_-
And banks can (and will) charge card fees. They probably do already in some places. And if card is your only options then you have to pay these fees and they can charge you whatever the fuck they want. And they will because that's what banks do. They exist to get money put of your account.
And banks that are like "we don't have any cash but you can use our ATM" ignoring the fact that not everyone can or will use an ATM and God forbid their 1 ATM go down, then what?
Banks: we've seen a decrease in physical money in the last few years so we're going to wind down physical money options.
As if there wasn't a pandemic that made a lot of people afraid to use money for the past 3 years!?!?!?!
I work retail and I can't be like "well we've barely had no sales this morning so that means we will only have a few in ther afternoon so I might as well close the store 4 hours early" that's not how it works.
Banks need more regulation imo and they shouldn't be allowed to go "cashless" because until our society fixes like capitalism/housing issues/domestic violence issues/mental health issues/etc we can't go cashless.
Like literally the only way we'd be able yo go cashless is if we live in a utopia where money doesn't exist. I'm sorry but the scifi dream of everyone having a chip in their wrist that is ID/money/bus pass/etc is a dystopian nightmare that capitalism would use to exploit everyone is they could.
I will admit I rarely use cash, I literally only use it for conventions (to stay on budget) or if someone owes me money and give me cash, I'll put it on my bus pass.
But just cuz I don't really use cash, doesn't mean it's not needed.
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