Cash is dissapering in Sweden. But its different here, right? Right? Interesting quote: "Financial privacy has been destroyed. Banks are now merely unpaid spies of bankrupt governments, and they will freeze you out of your life's savings in a heartbeat if some faceless bureaucrat orders them to do so."
Yes, it's different. I encounter very few places that will not take cash. Actually, I'm struggling to think of one. In fact I encounter places more frequently that only take cash. You can try and extrapolate the future if you want, but fact is in Australia cash is still doing just fine.
Care to take a guess as to what percentage of (legal) payments were made using cash in Australia this year?
No need to guess: http://www-dr.rba.gov.au/publications/bulletin/2014/jun/pdf/bu-0614-6.pdf Granted that data is old, and the cash graph is no doubt declining down. It would no longer be the dominate form of payment for sure. But the point I'm making is that cash still works on the street. And as I said, I encounter more places that are cash only than those that are card only, that's say a lot.
Future predictions: http://www.apca.com.au/docs/policy-debate/evolution-of-cash.pdf Still 43% cash projected in 2018
Correct, cash use is declining. Cash works best now for small transactions, but don't underestimate advances in cashless payment methods and declining technology costs, along with the possibility of high regulatory costs for handling cash transactions to discourage its use should the government decide that it wants to track more transaction flow. Some estimates predict cash will be gone in less than 10 year! (Sounds unbeleivable though)
I'm not underestimating anything. But we had one of the first and highest take-ups rates of cash-less transactions in the world, yet that does not seem to be reflecting in places that don't take cash. It's nothing like the Sweden example, not even close. Why I wonder? It is, that's pure fantasy.
We've all seen the government test the waters with taking "unclaimed" cash from dormant bank accounts. It's a preview of what's to come.
99.999% of the population have no fear of having their bank accounts frozen, the thought has not even crossed their mind, and rightly so, because it's never happened in this country en masse. If they raise the GST to 15% then the cash service economy will boom.
Sweden is becoming a socialist basket case with a circle-jerk tax policy that results in 1 in 3 Swede's being employed by the government and a further 30% receiving salary support from the government... which then taxes it's citizens more than 50% of their wages. The average sick leave taken is nearly a month per year and everyone seems to have their hands out for some sort of Govt. assistance..like this for instance... "Swedish man gets disability benefits after his heavy metal obsession is declared an 'addiction' " Read more at http://www.nme.com/news/various-artists/83117#TE1CfuAy7lz75Vmk.99 Innovation and productivity have been stifled Property rights have been downtrodden by Sweden's "Right to roam" legislation and everything is old and bleak what a boring S#ithole! Worst part of Europe I saw!