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Philadelphia Is First U.S. City to Ban Cashless Stores
- Thread starter TarpitCarnivore
- Start date
Seems like a dumb law to me. If there are lots of people stuck on cash only then there will still be plenty of stores accepting cash anyway.
Post office banking with no-fee accounts. It would be the only way to kind of get that universality.
There's a lot of inefficiency in cash despite the transaction fees of credit. Security liabilities, armed guards and transportation, more units of exchange meaning more maintenance and upkeep for destroyed currency. I'd rather we just focus on the access problems that the poor have to banks and debit cards.
Are you a poor and/or homeless minority without a bank account?
It's interesting the solution is "ban technology" rather than give poor people bank accounts with debt cards. Clearly politicians love to pass the buck on discrimination.
Tons of people still use check cashing places. So they have no bank account
Fuck pennies. As someone who works a register I wish pennies would go away forever. Theyre always filthy gross, theyre a pain to count, I hate them. On the rare occasion I use cash and get pennies for change I just leave them on the counter.
How exactly is it banning technology? It's giving customers more options.
Philly Mayor Jim Kenney: We should ban cashless stores because it adversely affects poor people (an accurate statement)
Me: What about the soda tax you use that taxes everything that isn't water or 100% juice by the ounce, which sure looks and sounds like a poor person tax
Kenney: GO BIIRRRRRDDDS
Me: What that's not going to help you now
Me: What about the soda tax you use that taxes everything that isn't water or 100% juice by the ounce, which sure looks and sounds like a poor person tax
Kenney: GO BIIRRRRRDDDS
Me: What that's not going to help you now
people who pay with card can -still- pay with card. nothing got banned from use
our business usually has a couple grand in transaction fees during the year, so we prefer cash if people wanna pay that way
Yep. I work in corporate for a retail company and we last heard that 20% of our customers use cash. There is too much of the population that only uses it based on income/wealth or other factors
Unless stores are mandated to have some way for people who don't have access to phones or other technology, I don't see how a cashless store would never not be discriminatory in nature. It makes much more sense to force stores to accept cash than try to and force stores to have some sort of work around for those who don't have access to cashless technology.
Weird, I can't fathom a business not wanting cash.
In NYC I usually deal with the opposite (cash-only establishments) or places that want you to spend a minimum to use a card (likely because them eating the fee is only worth it past a certain total). Some places actually tack the merchant fee onto your charge.
In NYC I usually deal with the opposite (cash-only establishments) or places that want you to spend a minimum to use a card (likely because them eating the fee is only worth it past a certain total). Some places actually tack the merchant fee onto your charge.
To be honest, this is just pushing the issue further down the line rather than actually solving it. When cash-less options expand, what would stop a company from charging people who use cash extra? Or just not giving back any change? They still accept cash, but the people that end up suffering the most would still end up being the poor.
The better solution I think would've been to expand access to debit cards. Ensure that everyone has easy/free access to an ATM and can easily get a debit card, along with free smartphone options for poorer people. This also has the added benefit of helping secure people's money since it's far easier to deal with a stolen card than money out of your wallet.
The better solution I think would've been to expand access to debit cards. Ensure that everyone has easy/free access to an ATM and can easily get a debit card, along with free smartphone options for poorer people. This also has the added benefit of helping secure people's money since it's far easier to deal with a stolen card than money out of your wallet.
The quotes were to make it tongue in cheek but it's a regressive stance. Physical money is dirty, costs resounces to manufacture and is inefficient. Paper bags and plastic straws are also options, but we've specifically outlawed those because they do not represent modern values of efficency, here it's optional to operate. But I feel bad for snarking because it seemed to be the only takeaway quoters had. Not the idea of basic necessities and elevating the baseline. None of these people actually care, it's really just old people who are culturally attached to money making excuses and ignoring obvious and superior solutions.
Huh? No it isn't. There's 14 million people without bank accounts and not accepting cash necessarily discriminates against poor people.
You misread the post. Banking should be a right garaunteed by the government. Not just for cashless stores but because it measurably improves financial outcomes and prevents addional garnishing of pay. How about politicians stand up for that.
Because that's a very long term goal and poor people are having their access restricted now.
Huh, I thought this would be about those payday loan stores that charge a huge amount of interest.
Which comes with fees for usage, stoage and loading of money and withdrawals or transfer of money. This further punishes th poor and why it is so very much more expensive to live poor.
1) Robbery/internal theft risk
2) preparation of and armored car pickups of deposits cost money.
3) no longer have to keep/maintain floats
Still stupid, but there are benefits.
Then it's even worse we're accepting non-solutions while we're in a transition period. These idiots think they fixed the problem. I understand the politics are the same for job automation and climate change but compared to those this is a complete slam dunk. The technology exists and is dirt cheap, ebt is already most of the way there.
Technically, those minimum purchase limits are directly against the TOS of the credit card companies and you can report stores for doing that. But why would you? The fee does hurt them so I get it.
Also, as somebody who lives in a building with a cashless store that was broken into a few weeks ago, I feel like a lot of posters are ignoring the rather obvious benefit of going cashless - no cash to steal.
I certainly get the issues with it but it feels more like people who are against it are upset about conditions in their city more than what the stores are doing. Going cashless isn't some inherently anti-poor slick move, it simplifies literally everything about keeping books, tracking customer spending, paying taxes, and safety. I'd rather we not live in this constant tracking world, but this move seems kinda silly, plus it's not like it's required for online vendors so it's just another burden on local store owners who are trying to simplify.
There are costs to managing cash. Fee can be cheaper.
Amex Serve debit cards are free.
Wow, you know how to tell you are a completely self involved person? When you think society and law should conform to your personal preferences.
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There has been some talks about the latter in recent years, mainly with the idea of adding turning post offices into credit unions (plus, still taking care of mail and other things). It would help both the post office and numerous communities where banking options are limited, restrictive, etc. It hasn't gotten a lot of traction, though, as its a pretty low-key policy.
Theft insurance does exist for businesses.
Yeah the people who are against this are either really self involved or ignorant.
Most poor people will never have a credit card or bank account and live check to check just barely getting by.
Stupid question: What are the odds this gets appealed? Assuming the store has chains in multiple states could they claim only the federal government can restrict their payment options under Article 1 Section 8?
Until a city actually does productive steps to solve homelessness or poverty then I will never accept that they are doing anything to help low-income in earnest. This just reeks of nothing to me.
This makes no sense. They can't fix the problem of poor people not having bank accounts or permanent addresses or proper identification or the myriad other things needed to properly bank currently in anything approaching a reasonably short timeline. They can implement this simple change to address a problem that exists and do nothing to slow the adoption of cashless options.
They're not free to reload and also have a $1 monthly fee. The free reload one has a $5 monthly fee.
Yup. I don't know if it's temporary because there are some renovations going on, but a grocery store near me just added more self checkouts and the majority of them do not accept cash.
There's multiple reasons:
1. It prevents theft, both from people robbing the register (since there's no money) but also from money being "taken" off the top by the workers.
2. It makes the process easier and quicker to buy, you don't hold up the line getting out money, having to deduct the money they give you into change and then give that back to them, etc.
Also taking cash isn't "free" at all for retailers, they have to pay for armored cars to pick it up, they have to pay bank fees, they have to get change from the banks (to make sure they have enough change to break the bills from customers throughout the day), etc, which all add up.
Going cashless just makes the whole thing easier on the retailer, they can put the 3% fee into the price of their products too so the consumers eat the cost, not them. So in the end it's quicker and easier to get customers through the store and their workers don't have to constantly deal with money, exchanging it, etc.
The drawback is that it ends up hurting the lower income people and those that don't have access to credit/debit cards or online payment services.
my big beef is that a cashless society gives too much power to the gov't and corporations.
"Sooperkool, we don't like what you've been saying about us"
Next thing you know I have no access to either my money or that entire corporations services at the tap of a button.
"Sooperkool, we don't like what you've been saying about us"
Next thing you know I have no access to either my money or that entire corporations services at the tap of a button.
I never carry cash. It should be just as outrageous that a store only accepts cash as it is a store that only accepts plastic.
OP
OP
My counter to this: Gas stations that charge more for credit, or stores that impose minimums for using credit. These things already happen, so I don't think you're argument is super strong here.