“Citizens should not be put under general suspicion.”
By Don Quijones, Spain & Mexico, editor at WOLF STREET.
There are two sides in the global war against cash. On one side are many of the world’s governments, central banks, fintech firms, banks, credit card companies, telecommunication behemoths, financial institutions, large retailers, etc. According to them, the days of physical currency are numbered, so why not pull the plug already, beginning with the largest denomination bills such as the $100-note and particularly the €500-note?
On the other side are people who like to use cash – most of whom, according to the dominant official narrative, are either criminals or terrorists. After all, they must have something to hide; otherwise, why would they use a private, untraceable (not to mention archaic, dirty, dangerous and unhygienic) form of payment like cash?
The powers that want to kill off cash already have vital technological and generational trends firmly on their side, along with widespread public ignorance, apathy, and disinterest. But in recent weeks the unlikeliest of defenders of physical money has emerged: the national central bank of Europe’s biggest economy, the German Bundesbank.
“I have my doubts that introducing a cash limit or getting rid of bigger denominations can really prevent terrorists or criminals from engaging in illegal activities,” Carl-Ludwig Thiele, Bundesbank board member in charge of cash issues, said in a speech last week. “We also should ask ourselves: what sort of an understanding of government forms the basis of these proposals? Citizens should not be put under general suspicion.”
Thiele is not the first Bundesbank official to publicly defend cash. Bundesbank president Jens Weidmann warned in the Bundesbank’s annual report that killing off higher denomination banknotes, a policy supported by ECB President Mario Draghi, could have a debilitating effect on trust in cash in general and would be “disastrous” if people started to believe cash would be abolished — an oblique reference to the risk of negative interest rates and the escalating war on cash triggering a run on cash.
The Wall Street Journal accused Weidmann of simply talking his book:
The European Central Bank no longer produces figures on where high denomination banknotes are issued, but from the onset of the Eurozone in 1999 to the end of 2009, Germany issued almost half of all €200 and €500 bills over the decade.
When a central bank issues physical currency, it gains seigniorage income. It makes loans or buys securities that do bear interest while issuing euro banknotes that don’t, so it makes a profit over time… In the ECB, seigniorage is pooled, but as the largest in the bloc, the Bundesbank gets the biggest chunk of that income.
Whatever the Bundesbank’s motives, its opposition to euthanizing physical currency could end up proving to be a very sizable thorn in cash’s would-be assassins’ hide. Thiele, relentlessly in his speech:
“Quite prominent economists, such as the former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, Kenneth Rogoff, have called to abolish cash for monetary policy purposes, so that banks could enforce negative interest across the board.”
“This would, in my view, be the wrong response to the monetary policy challenges at the zero lower bound. Instead of financial repression it would make much more sense to discuss how economies could achieve stronger growth again through higher interest rates.”
In its own study on the use of cash, prominently featured on its homepage today, the Bundesbank found that despite all the media hype over the demise of cash, physical currencies still remain king across many advanced economies.
In the study more than 18,500 consumers in Australia, Austria, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, and the United States kept a written record of what payment methods they used. Turns out, consumers still frequently opt for cash at the point of sale, in some countries more so than others. The report included this chart:
In terms of volume, cash accounted for more than 50% of payment transactions in all of these countries, with the exception of the US. In Germany (DE) and Austria (AT) over 80% of cash transactions were made using cash. In both countries, cash payments also dominated in value. A separate study by the Association of German Banks found that even among millennials, two-thirds prefer paying in cash to electronic means.
What’s crucial isn’t so much the numbers but the very fact that the Bundesbank publishes this type of report so prominently, and in English so that everyone can read it. It’s an obvious part of its campaign to keep cash-in-fist alive as a choice. And in Germany and Austria, the EU’s plans to suppress cash have already provoked a backlash.
“We don’t want someone to be able to track digitally what we buy, eat and drink, what books we read and what movies we watch,” said Austrian Deputy Economy Minister Harald Mahreron on Oe1 radio. “We will fight everywhere against rules” including caps on cash purchases, he said.
Germany’s big tabloid The Bild published a scathing open letter titled, “Hands Off Our Cash,” while a broad spectrum of political parties condemned the proposed measures as an attack on data protection and privacy.
The fact that Europe’s most powerful national central bank is now firmly aligned with the defenders of physical cash could be a vital game changer in the war against cash.
The Bundesbank seems to see the war on cash as a war on personal freedom and choice, in the name of saving a financial system and its absurd negative interest rates:
“We want citizens to be able to pay in whatever form they desire. Especially in Germany, cash is part of that,” said Thiele. And he warned that “freedom always dies bit by bit.” Few countries know that better than Germany. By Don Quijones, Raging Bull-Shit.
Bundesbank President Weidmann had put it this way a couple of weeks ago: “It would be fatal if citizens got the impression that cash is gradually taken away from them.” Read… As War on Cash Escalates, Cash Lovers Fight Back.
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There are many small purchases which don’t suit being paid for by card swipe. Some shops demand an extra payment for paying by card for any items amounting to less than £5.00
Easy solution, get rid of paper money, use coins for small purchases. ;)
That would be an easy solution, but the proposals all have to do with getting rid of cash, not just paper money. The idea is to start at the top, since the point is that few people use those high-denomination bills. The follow-up phase will get to the elimination of all cash, including coins, so that only electronic payments exist.
Let me repeat: All cash payments will be eliminated, so that only electronic payments will exist. Coins will then be barter items, and to use them would require agreement on a value between vendor and buyer. If barter isn’t also decreed to be illegal.
Very sound response. The idea is total control. When I control my earned income in cash I know where it is at all times, when the cash is eliminated and goes digital, everybody on the DEIH Digital Electrical Information Highway will have access to my entire cash assets (there is NO perfectly safe method). Even young school kids are highly astute at electronic hacking, they can break about any code, usually just about as fast as a new code is introduced. The “Digital Highway” is replete with potential security problems. The plan is for the government(s) to hold our feet to the fire in every aspect of our being, as well as to stop big banking from losing very substantial amounts of money each year through checking and other means. Stop and consider the many ramifications in favor of government’s and banking institutions this will open the doors to. We’re talking unparalleled POWER over mankind. Control food and money and you control the world, every tyrants dream come true. We’re already tracked physically within one square foot via GPS and strategically located biometrically capable cameras world wide, we’re facing physical and monitory regional control (where we will be required to live), they will ultimately determine where we live and work. I can visualize the requirement for an state authorized passport just to travel from one designated region (of ten) in America alone (Google US ten region setup). This is taking the herd mentality to a whole new level. This is Orwell (suggested reading) on steroids!
Coins get heavy and purses that are smaller would be a problem and men’s pants pockets would rip. Small businesses would have to pay for smaller credit card purchases by customers, would put financial strain on them. Many work for cash (lawn care, flea markets, etc). Stores that have been breached cannot be trusted for any thing used except cash (Home Depot, Target and others) Cash has it’s place in everyday business.
Small gold coins are not too heavy for value. 40 US nickels (roll) is $2 face value, but the same number/size of American Gold Eagles (.25ozT) is about $14000 (weighs 2x as much, but fits in pants pocket easily). That’s 6 months wages for median worker, and considering that 50% of people have less than $500 in liquid form (or any form), one small gold coin and a few pieces of silver do the job.
For paying your lawn service, properly valued silver would get you a month of super-deluxe landscaping for a few coins (plata!) ASE’s (s/g ~25:1, silver $200/ozT, gold at $5000ozT). Yes, that is median wage of 1/2 ounce of gold per month, still ~$35K/year.
Cash limits your liability to losing that bill/coin. Your whole bank account/credit-line is not being offered to get a snack & drink. Don’t trust your server, pay cash.
to preserve ones freedom we need a gold backed currency….when we have no control over how much credit is created …. we lose…the only winner is the person in charge of creating the credit….the person creating the credit will have too much power and could easily become corrupt and abuse the system.
…80% of cash transactions were made using cash.
Well I hope so. I always pay for my cash transactions with cash.
Like
Debit cards and other “digital wallets” are simulating cash as they’re immediate reductions in ones money storage accounts upon transaction. I can imagine that the gov will just keep eliminating the need for large denomination bills and thus drive everyone towards a virtually cashless society.
The Global economy won’t last long enough for this to happen!
That is its saving grace. It doesn’t matter now if we have helicopter money or any other method of helping the poor survive better than today.
Our finite world is closing in on our spendthrift and decadent days.
Don’t tell the PTB, the 0.1% groups. It’ll just make the decline more manic as they will ramp up their extravagances.
agreed. this entirescenario are just that last thrashing of a dinosaur sinking into the tar pits. interesting to view and hear about, but not much more than that.
the list of transactions that actually REQUIRE cash or some VERY CLOSE cash equivalent is so long as to boggle the mind.
there might be just enough time for the banksters to begin an effort, but that effort in and of itself, could [and should] be that event that triggers Mister Black Swan FAIL.I always laugh unti I nearly vomit when I read about a ONE THOUSAND MULTI METRIC STATISTICAL MODEL, that supposedly ‘models’ the economic transactions of some 7 BILLION people world wide.
the hubris of these wanna be is breath taking to the rational well grounded person.
its like that ancient rock & roll song
“dream on, dream on, dream on til your dream comes true”
I have no intention to hold my breath.
hahahahahaha
Killing cash is one more way the Deep State is killing democracy. Cash is a vote for fairness. Cash keeps vital parts of the economy going that otherwise would not.
Many small retailers are bled by credit/debit card banks. Up to 5% plus of their sales.
If ending criminals and corruption was really the objective, then those criminals in banking and finance, that feed from the warm blood of the productive middle class, should off themselves.
We will not go quietly into the night! We will be such a thorn in their side they will pay for it all the way down their demise.
They will not be able to convert people who tasted freedom back to slavery. They will have to generate a new crop of slaves that have no idea what freedom is, and only then their cashless society will work.
However the taste will not have the save savoring flavor of a hunted game.
They will be unsatisfied. Forever
That new crop of slaves are called millenials. Hence the rise of Bernie Sanders
The sanders mob see all those parental houses, coming to them, mortgage free.
They dont realise they are just usefully idiots, and that Comrade Sanders, has other owners in mind, for those houses.
I never use my debit cards nowadays having had my wallet stollen and my two debit cards used to extract 600€ from the two accounts . The theives apparently swiped the cards through a machine which took all details of them and then blank cards have your details transferred to them and they DON’T need a pin mumber ! The lack of security of debit & credit cards is a total disgrace , but not many people know of it .
The banks don’t care about the cards being misused because the loses are passed on to the merchants.
I’ve had $39,000 and $5,000 take from these cards. The latter being by the bank itself!!!! They squealed like pigs when I took out all my cash. Do not fall for it or you will lose everything! Trust me on this. Once whilst slightly drunk, I keyed my pin number when the waiter was asking for a tip. My pin number was over 9400 and I had spent over $600 on a card with $10,000 limit and that over the limit rejection is what saved me my from giving the waiter a tip over $9,400!!!!
Ok, so you’re not a tip welcher, hopefully! :)
Why are the US $1 coins not used ? They mint them, but I never see or use them.
The Canadian $1 and $2 coins are easily recognizable, but the US $1 coin is very androgynous with the 25 cent coin, perhaps this is the main reason. And who approved the US $1 coin’s design ? They should be fired for their approval for such a poor design, unless the hidden agenda was for the US $1 coin to fail.
Habit. We’re used to $1-dollar bills. And when the coins came out, the cash registers didn’t even have a compartment for them. They’re close enough to quarters to where you really have to pay attention…. In short, I think I’m no exception when I say that I never liked using them.
The $2-dollar bill too died an ignominious death for similar reasons.
We need a $3 bill instead.
Random but funny: I got a letter from a bank where I closed an account and apparently there was an interest payment so the balance was $0.01
The letter goes on to explain that no action would result in forfeiture of my money.
Of course I requested payment. They’re gonna send me a check :)
Why wouldn’t they send me a physical penny?
LOL
I think it was…we should have stayed with Eisenhower dollars, which at least looked and felt real.
From experience, the stupid $1 coins used now don’t work well in tollbooths and certain vending machines. In each case, I have had them mistaken for quarters, and wasted quite a bit of coin. They are a total disaster.
To clarify:
There are plenty of people who live on the margins, that don’t pay taxes, but DO NOT CONSUME TAXES. They have too much pride to be on welfare and so scrape by in the underground economy.
If the objective is to expand ill-will then our self-appointed Masters are heading in the right direction. For these international criminals, they better hope there is a safe place on this planet that will take them.
Don’t worry, they’ve got suitcases full of cash to pay their way anywhere. :-)
These people who won’t join the Borg FSA economy value often their privacy and won’t trade it for a small monthly EBT or revocable “pension” that comes with a “social services” inspector. There’s an armed Sheriff Deputy behind every clipboard-wielding dot-gov Human Services Enforcer putting her idea of correctness on you. It might be better to live in a van and keep moving.
Marginal people living in Systeme D pay lots of unavoidable sales/fuel/road/lodging/communication/eating taxes from their small cash incomes.
Many of these “no longer counted as unemployed” people are highly skilled. Some have interesting combat skills from their time in Uncle Sam’s adventure teams. Don’t push too hard, or there will be pushback.
To any citizens of the world that are in favor of getting rid of cash, I would like to propose a few questions:
1. Who is the true owner of your banking deposits? (Hint: It’s not you.)
2. Are you 100% certain that you do not have any outstanding warrants?
3. Are you 100% certain that you will never commit any act that could, either now or in the future, be considered a crime?
4. What will you spend for food when the store refuses your ATM card because of a dispute between you and the bank, or you and the tax man?
5. What will you use to spend when your credit spending limit is drastically reduced, under the false pretense that you didn’t fill out a report with your bank to allow you to spend “your money”?
6. What will you do when the ATM network breaks down, either because of a hack or a government action?
I hope you would think about these issues before you make such a hasty decision about wanting to get rid of cash.
And I also would be interested in any thoughtful responses.
Well Said!
In truth losing all control of the units I am allotted for my sweat and effort terrifies me. If that happens, we will truly be slaves and fully reliant on the system not to take advantage of us.
Consider the following:
It is impossible for any entity, no matter how technologically advanced, to hack the cash in a person’s safe. Not so with the electronic money in the bank.
The State-legal pot business in the US is a multibillion dollar business. Because the US Gov’t still considers pot to be an illegal substance, banks refuse to get involved in the transactions. Consequently, the legal pot business is a cash business. Doing away with cash will certainly kill the State-legal pot biz.
Without Glass-Steagall, and without cash, bank bail-ins could wipe out depositors.
And yet many of the largest banks have no problem raking in billions from laundering illegal drug money from all over the world. I’d love to know the mechanism for that cash being converted to digital 1s & 0s.
Wrong. Inflation, or even mere money-printing, reduces the value of the cash in your safe incrementally. It doesn’t go “poof!” gone, but it’s nibbled at every year even in “stable” first-world economies. Argentina had a higher income per person than the united States in 1900, and the Peso was strong. That Peso is an almost-zero value (one quadrillionth?) in buying power now. Who got the value? Not you, the inheritor of your GGfathers paper money savings.
Democracy? If you are not an American citizen then you might live in a democracy. The United States has never been nor will it ever be a democracy. If you are an American, surly at one point in your life you said ‘The Pledge of Allegiance’. If only The Great Debate was required reading, Americans just might understand then that this country was set up by rich land owners trying to protect their holding from the King of England. Nothing has changed. Main Street USA are the soldier ants, cooks, maids, teachers, doctors and so forth. For this service, one is allow to enjoy a small portion of the spoils of war. One’s tenacity and cunningness determines their share of the spoils. These things are handed down like docility and stupidity.
Democracy leads to tyranny. The ambitious people discover that voting is easier and faster than making/mining/growing wealth.
A republic can stand over several generations if run by virtuous people, but ‘mercans! aren’t majority virtuous people nor running a Republic since 1850’s. There is no longer an overwhelming (90%+) one-kind-of-people/culture to impose order on all. Add shortages instead of huge wealth of an unexplored continent and it’s ugly.
I have a favourite Chinese restaurant I like to eat lunch at about once every two weeks. The food is excellent, the portions are large, and you leave feeling you got your money’s worth. They only sell Chinese food, and nothing else. About all a person can eat bills out/up to $12.00 cdn. The service is excellent and the one and only waitress has worked there for as long as I remember. She not only knows everyone’s names, she knows where you live and what your interests are. If I am by myself she hunts down a fresh paper for me to read while I eat. I always always hand them 3 fives and walk away for them to do what they want with the register/tip/receipt. Let’s be frank here, everyone prefers cash. My son is doing a big job for a new business reno. He usually charges out at $65.00/hour. For this job he charges out at $50.00 and is paid cash, in hundreds, at the end of each day. This is by customer request.
We pay lots and lots of taxes in Canada. When people get a chance to be paid in cash once in a great while, it’s a real treat. When I was in ‘the system’ almost 40% of my salary was deducted at source. Like I said, between income taxes, GST (a VAT), Provincial sales taxes, we pay enough….more than enough. When I worked extra jobs above and beyond my legit straight 40 hour week job, I asked for cash.
Oh yeah, one more restaurant cash story. I have mentioned this before. My favourite little take-out place is in Courtenay. They have been in business almost 50 years. The sign on the main wall greets every customer when they order. “No Chargex. No Credit Cards. No Debit Cards. CASH ONLY.” Awesome!!!
Similar to my favorite eating establishment. It’s a Greek restaurant, owned and run by the same Greek family for over 50 years now. Really good food at reasonable prices. With every Monday night a special pasta night.
The owner and his wife work there almost every day. On Monday’s they take turns manning the till. When a customer pays by debit or credit card the till drawer is closed and the purchase rung in, with the drawer remaining open by a fingers width. When cash is proffered for payment, nothing is rung in and change is made from the open drawer.
The one great thing about cash, is the thing that is truly despised by all governments. It tells no tales and leaves no trails! This is why the established elites in the hierarchy want the death of cash. So they may “dip their beaks” in literally every transaction.
“As nightfall does not come at once, neither does oppression. In both instances, there is a twilight when everything remains seemingly unchanged. And it is in such twilight that we all must be most aware of change in the air–however slight–lest we become unwitting victims of the darkness.”
– William O. Douglas
Too late, too late.
Having lived through the hell of having the government freeze my bank accounts due to a tax dispute – let me tell you that I will NEVER sit idly by while cash is eliminated.
The CRA just applied pressure on me by freezing all my accounts. They didn’t care that I couldn’t feed my family. They just told me that the accounts remain frozen until I paid why they alleged I owed them.
I was forced to pay them their ‘assessed’ amounts.
Then a year later – after going to court…I was awarded all the money back. They were in the wrong.
So…there you go. Once cash is gone, your freedom to dispute the amounts you owe is also gone.
So….fuck the CRA and fuck all the assholes who want to eliminate cash…they know not what they do.
In a higher sense you are probably right in saying “they know not what they do.” But in terms of the lower calculative mind, they know exactly what they are doing.
And we are in very deep trouble. I spent my life around professors the majority of which could think only in the same categories they learned in school, and could not (or would not) make a sound deduction based upon the obvious facts before them. And they are a minority of the population! Think how much worse it is for the “man in the street” who has no intellectual training whatsoever. Gird up your loins brother. Something is coming, and it won’t be good. JWC
Once cash goes, the cost of using electronic money can be hiked as high as they wish, both merchant and customer will just have to suck it up, so you will have negative interest rates on your savings coupled with outrageous service fees for using electronic cash.
You get nailed both ways and there is nothing you can do about it, at the moment the threat of people using cash for transactions does mitigate electronic fees.
Non-electronic money (paper or silver) is also not affected by electrical outages.
What happened to “something something better to let 10 guilty persons go free than an innocent wrongly convicted something something?”
Once you destroy money the void will be filled with a Barter system between individuals and the banking system will be a thing of the past.
Has anyone ever made thousands of dollars of fraudulent purchases in another country with the cash in your wallet? On 9/11, when the cell systems were overloaded and you couldn’t make a call, did you have a land line backup for an emergency call?
The degree of hacking of everything electronic should tell us that a well stocked back-up system should be kept in place.
“Citizens should not be put under general suspicion.”
This says it all, does it not? And why are there not more voices who see the dangers of this growing power of technology to tyrannize a formerly free people and end the experiment in democracy that was started only a short 250 years ago.
Jack-booted police in the streets have been a terrible side of the 20th Century, but that will be nothing compared to what they will have when our new authoritarian lords have the new techno-powers of Big Brother well in place and watching everyone everywhere, eh?
For tyrants the people are always the enemy, and all are “under general suspicion.” We have turned the various “democracies” over to the same ethical cyphers we kicked out in the 18 Century and after.
“Nevermind. What’s on the tube?”
So, while we are the frogs in the slowly boiling pot, we are so stupid that we thing we are in the damn jacuzzi! Goodness.
Jay Warren Clark
Because there are so few people reading finance blogs like you and me. On average, probably greater than 9 out of 10 people (at least in the US) do not understand this stuff. When I try to talk to my family about NIRP, they either glaze over or look at me like I have three eyes.
But my father-in-law is an immigrant contractor. I think that he would go off the deep end if he could no longer be paid in cash or pay his employees in cash. I laugh, actually, at the thought of the angry mobs forming and the central bankers thinking, “my God, what have we done!?” as the mobs close in on the Eccles Building. Just sayin.
Digital money means string attached. You have been warned.
Only criminals carry guns and cash!
Where do I turn myself in?
:-]
You really need that/a “up vote post” tab, bud.
Jew’s are the most robbed and extorted from, group on this planet, in all known history.
The vast majority of those acts of robbery and extortion, have been carried out. by Governments, and their agents.
“Honest men carry, Guns and Cash.
Criminals carry Guns, and sometimes, Guns and Badges.”
(me but similar has been said before. I am Sure)
“He wasnt a Cop. He was a Mugger with a Badge.” Drug dealer defending, successfully, a murder charge.
I never tip digitally. When I rarely buy dinner with a card, the tip is always zero. The tip is in cash on the table.
The laws will be always for thee and not for me(politicians,bankers,cronies of).So time to secede from Comrad Obama and the N W O communists
Cash is an asset that you own and always have access to. If your bank fails, your cash is not lost but your bank account could be frozen for weeks and then subject to a bail in, as Cypriots discovered a few years ago. Family businesses were ruined, retirees lost their savings, but many of the large account holders were sophisticated enough to wire their assets to London branches and escaped the “haircut”. It was the little guy who suffered most.
Do you really trust banks and government so absolutely that you would be prepared to put you financial fate entirely in their hands, with no possible avenue of escape?
Even if you do, there will always be a significant % of the population that will refuse to accept financial serfdom. They will be branded as criminals, subversives, financial terrorists. What a healthy, happy democratic dictatorship that will be!
Remember, when you deposit cash at your local bank it ceases to be yours. The bank is not holding your cash in a demand deposit account that you can assuredly access at any time. Legally, you have loaned your money to the bank. The bank does not act in a warehousing capacity. It has the legal right to use your loan in any way it sees fit. The bank can only honor its obligation as a debtor to its depositors as long as it remains solvent. However, since all banks lend long on the asset side of their balance sheet and borrow short on the liability side (primarily your demand deposit) they are always incapable of surviving a bank run. Loss of depositor confidence results in almost immediate bankruptcy. If just 10% of deposits withdraw in a short time frame, the typical bank will fail unless propped up by central bank “elastic” money – that magic money created from nowhere.
Bankers want to do away with cash for two reasons. First, no cash ensures that there cannot be a systemwide run. Yes, depositors could flee one bank but their funds would just be deposited in other banks. Systemwide deposits would remain unchanged. Second, the banking system would finally, after hundreds of years of effort, have achieved financial monopoly. You should then expect quality of service to drop and costs to rise. Innovation would stagnate. Consolidations would result in a handful of banks gobbling up all the competition or even nationalization under a single “publicly owned” bank. Every time you use a credit card you will be paying 2% or more to the financial system.
Imagine your bank operating with the efficiency of Obamacare, the USPS, or an inner city public school.
secede F the bankers that will use non cash transactions to screw every man woman and child.Time to pull all $$$$ from banks