[seibelj]

The question is whether someone has a legal right to conduct a monetary transaction anonymously. I think if you get to the root of the issue, most governments would prefer to track every transaction to ensure compliance with tax, money laundering, [insert whatever regulation].

However I think the state already has an absurd amount of power and the citizens need every tool possible to prevent governments from hurting them. Anonymous transactions, such as those using cash but also using new technologies like privacy-focused cryptocurrencies, are essential to keeping the state from becoming a panopticon. You can already see the inevitable outcome of all-powerful government with the ridiculous situation in Hong Kong and the social credit system in China.

[cstejerean]

It’s not just anonymity. To get a credit/debit card you need to agree to some TOS, probably binding arbitration, and are at the mercy of the bank deciding whether or not they want to cancel your account.

That would be my problem with cashless, the idea that people could be cut off entirely from the system and have no way to transact. Until the government / central bank will issue everyone a irrevocable bank account with the right to transact for free indefinitely getting rid of cash has bigger issues than just privacy implications.

[toomanybeersies]

The solution to that particular problem would be to make it a legal right to have a bank account. It doesn't have to have all the extras, just an account that stores your money, and a card you can use for accessing your money.

[dest]

In France, if I am mot mistaken, you can legally have an account at the Banque de France. People go there when they got kicked from regular banks, like after having signed checks without having the money. Banque de France has become an heuristic for landlords to reject candidates, so having a right for bank account might not be enough.

[a3_nm]

You are thinking about the "droit au compte" (right to a bank account) https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Droit_au_compte but I think there may be some confusion. People exercise their "droit au compte" by making a request the Banque de France, but they do not have an account there: Banque de France designates some regular commercial bank which is then legally obliged to provide them with an account. The French Wikipedia page says that, in practice, this is usually La Banque postale: it's a pretty normal bank that I don't think anyone discriminates against.

[dest]

Thanks for those precisions

[reallydontask]

In the UK the biggest banks have to offer a free basic current account.

Requirements basically boil down to acceptable ID

[DanBC]

Basic bank accounts are not always available to people with a fraud marker against them.

https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/saving/article-6367319/C...

[reallydontask]

I stand corrected.

I remember when my wife first moved to this country, it was extremely difficult for her to open a current account, I thought that the basic accounts would solve those problems and probably do.

They clearly don't solve all problems.

It is a bit odd though that this is the case as surely allowing people to use the accounts allow for the transactions to be traced, rather than the anonymity of cash.

Quite possibly there are good reasons, for the bank but on 5 hours of sleep so I can't come up with any :)

[lixtra]

And you think those landlords would rent to cash payers?

[DanBC]

In England many landlords would rent to someone who provides the entire 6 months + deposit or 1 year + deposit in advance in cash, if there was an explanation.

[ur-whale]

In France, you can't buy a car with cash. Not exactly a shining example.

[roenxi]

That is an extremely sweeping requirement that also embeds a lot of assumptions into the legal system that are not sensible. We've seen something similar before when South Korean banks [0] managed to lock themselves in to the dawn of the software industry and have spent more than a decade looking like idiots.

This whole situation is happening because cash is very flexible and we innovated away from it when it became a bad idea. At any stage over the next few decades the basic nature of the playing field could change and this 'right to have a bank account' could totally stomp out innovation.

Not to mention; if at any point now or in the future a loophole slips in to the legislative process consumers could get roasted.

This is a poor solution to a non-problem. Just let people transact in cash.

[0] https://www.forbes.com/sites/elaineramirez/2016/11/30/south-...

[toomanybeersies]

Banks have been around for hundreds of years. All I'm proposing is that there is a legal right for people to hold a bank account of some form, where they are able to put their money so they don't have all their life savings in cash under the bed. I'm not suggesting that we ban cash at all, just that people have a right to securely store their money and the option to use cashless transactions if they choose.

Being legally required to hold a bank account use cashless transactions is just as much of a violation of one's rights as being barred from opening a bank account and being forced to use cash for all transactions. Two sides of the same coin, so to speak. It's not about allowing people to transact in cash, but allowing them alternative choices, all of which should be legal.

If you can't hold a bank account (because the banks have decided you're not allowed one for whatever reason), you need to use cash for everything. This means you always have a relatively large amount of cash on you. Not only are you now at greater risk of burglary or robbery, the consequences of being a victim are now even greater. You also can't put money in a savings account, or pay for things online.

I've had my house burgled and had large amounts of cash stolen from me before. There was nothing the police could do. Even if they caught the burglar, the money wasn't coming back to me. It was a significant hit to my personal finances at the time.

Bank accounts and cashless transactions aren't just a way for the government to keep tabs on the population, they're also a form of security for the general population.

[mNovak]

This circles back to the anonymity issue though.. what level of authentication is required to obtain said card? Can I stand there and blatantly collect 20 cards under different names? How does the bank know I'm not a terrorist which they are legally bound not to transact with?

I suppose if they're just freely distributed from a vending machine, it just becomes plastic bills of arbitrary denomination.

[gsich]

And what do I need for said account? Passport, a residence? Not everyone has those.

[PeterisP]

"Not everyone has those" seems probably a USA-related perspective as people not having ID is a problem there; but in many places in Europe it's normal to assume that everyone does have a valid ID; you're required to get one when you become an adult, you're required to report if it gets lost/stolen so that it gets blocked and replaced. You don't have to have that ID with you, but not having a passport or ID card at all is a misdemeanor. Even homeless drug addicts generally have them because it's necessary for various things e.g. social services.

If someone needs banking services (or, really, any services from anyone) but don't have a proper gov't ID document then would be considered normal to require that the very first thing they'd need to do is to get/replace that ID. And if you have that, then that's all you need for basic banking services.

[gsich]

You are not required to have such a thing in at least some states in Europe. Example in [0] (in german). UK also does not require you to have a passport or other id.

Getting such a thing requires a bank account or at least cash. How do you get cash if you don't have an ID? You can't get a bank account, so you can't collect unemployment benefits.

[0] https://www.ris.bka.gv.at/JudikaturEntscheidung.wxe?Abfrage=...

[toomanybeersies]

I'm not proposing that bank accounts are a legal requirement, but rather that access to banking is a legal right.

[gsich]

And for "banking" you need a "bank account".

[ur-whale]

No, the solution to this problem is to take money entirely out of the hands of government, who have proved time and again over the span of millennia to be incapable of managing the money supply as well as using it towards nefarious ends (political control, wars, etc...)

[toomanybeersies]

Yes, because when the management of the money supply is put into private hands, that has worked so well. Company scrips [1] were great for the people.

You haven't actually proposed a solution. Who should control the supply of money? Private companies? Because they have an even worse track record to governments.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Company_scrip

[ur-whale]

Cryptos.

Neither controlled by govts nor by corporations.

I thought this was self-evident, my bad, I guess.

[Svip]

But if you abandon cash, people would themselves find an alternative means of bartering. A means of which the government would not be in control. Even if only a miniscule of transactions are done with cash, surely the government would like to remain in control of said transactions, and thus would not be so quick to abandon it?

[numakerg]

You wouldn't have to go as far as bartering. I didn't see anything in the article about banning other currencies. People would just adopt the next most stable/integrated currency, like USD.

[Svip]

Which would still put the local government out of the loop. When you have a currency crisis like Zimbabwe did, it kind of make sense, they would eventually abandon their own and allow foreign ones instead. But it was not without deep reluctance, considering that most transactions in Zimbabwe is completely out of its control.

Of course, we are not talking about hyperinflation in Austria. Something that forced Zimbabwe to take a momentous decision. Why would the US Federal Reserve consider the interest of Austrians - in this fantasy scenario where they go cashless, and people start using USD - when valuing their currency?

I mean, if cash transactions are in different currency than that of your local jurisdiction, then - for a lot of people - it would start to make sense to simply keep their bank accounts in the same currency (and private banks would surely offer this). This could have an effect on people who doesn't use cash at all, since they would at times deal with people who do sometimes. And then having their money in that foreign currency too is an advantage.

Of course, I am only speculating. Since we have no experience with what happens if a society abandons cash, it will be hard to tell what the broader effects of that will be. Could be a total loss of monetary control for the government, or merely an inconvenience for foreign tourists.

[rumcajz]

The mention of goverment having control of the currency in the discussion about Austria reminded me of the Worgl experiment: view-source:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W%C3%B6rgl#The_W%C3%B6rgl_Expe...

[dymk]

None of the problems you mentioned with credit/debit cards is actually a practical concern for 99.99% of people.

[cbhl]

Adults, maybe, but it is not universal to issue debit cards to children (especially below the age of 16 or 13), let alone credit cards.

[mijamo]

It is universal on Sweden, from younger than that. And here most shops don't take cash at all anymore. TBH if I had a shop in Stockholm I wouldn't take cash either. Even public transport doesn't take cash.

On the other hand everybody here has a bank account for free, and free instant transactions between individuals.

[ekianjo]

This is a problem about rights, not statistics.

[dymk]

Right to what? Not use a credit card? You already have that right.

[ekianjo]

Not if the society goes cashless for the most part, which is what we are discussing here.

[guelo]

Until they have a conflict with their bank and realize they have no recourse.

[henrikschroder]

> The question is whether someone has a legal right to conduct a monetary transaction anonymously.

Well, a big argument for cash is that it allows you to do illegal transactions as well, and that this is extremely important, because who decides what is illegal and not? Making all illegal transactions impossible is a great way to stop civil disobedience, to stop dissenting movements, to stop anything the current regime simply doesn't like.

But those are the things driving our society forward.

[esoterica]

That's kind of an amusing line of thinking, that the government has an obligation to make doing illegal things as easy as possible, because sometimes doing the illegal thing is morally permissible. How far are you willing to go down that rabbit hole? For example, the existence of a police force makes it harder to break the law, should we disband the police to make engaging in civil disobedience easier?

[henrikschroder]

Government is us, the people. It's not some mythical entity separate from the society it exists in.

How far are you willing to go the other way? If the police knew where every single citizen was 100% of the time, crime rates would plummet! Super easy, fit everyone with a gps anklet, and make it punishable with jailtime for anyone who tampers with them or removes them. Tadaa!

It's a balance between fascism and liberty, between control and freedom. Removing cash moves that balance too far in the wrong direction, which is why we should oppose it, if we want a free society.

[Reelin]

> an obligation to make doing illegal things as easy as possible

(possible) != (as easy as possible)

The claim is that making illegal transactions impossible would cause societal harm.

I agree that it's an amusing idea, but it's also extremely important and not much talked about. Bruce Schneier touched on it in a 2018 essay (https://www.schneier.com/essays/archives/2018/11/surveillanc...).

> All social progress—from ending slavery to fighting for women's rights—began as ideas that were, quite literally, dangerous to assert.

[esoterica]

But illegal transactions would still be possible without cash (people pay for drugs on Venmo all the time), just trickier and with a higher likelihood of getting caught. By your logic a cashless society would still be acceptable.

[henrikschroder]

It's the turn-key fascism that's worrying. People buy drugs with Venmo because they're fucking stupid, and because banks and governments don't crack down on it. But they could.

Wikileaks ran into trouble when all the major credit card companies decided to deny payments to them.

Cash ensures that all transactions are allowed, anonymous, and untraceable, no matter the nature of the transaction, no matter society's morals, and no matter who's currently in charge of government.

[jkepler]

Better to build strong privacy by default into the one crypto with an 11-year track record for withstanding all attacks against it's network: Bitcoin. Of course, since consensus changes are really hard, and to preserve the 21 million coin hard limit, I suspect strong privacy will necessarily be built on layer 2 technologies like the Lightning Network. What's needed, and what Austrians (by citizenship or economic theory) want, is digital cash with real privacy.

[xiphias2]

There's a consensus in Bitcoin that the main next step towards better privacy is using Schnorr signature, but in the last few years there were multiple security issues found in the Schnorr signature based multisig protocol (MuSig).

After each improvement the devs prove the security of the protocol and present it in a cryptography conference, asking for peer reviews, that's why it's moving so slowly (which is great).

[CameronNemo]

How does this relate to campaign finance and funding of political speech?

[alexmlamb]

"ridiculous situation in Hong Kong"

How is it ridiculous? I can't think of any government, except maybe Canada, that would just allow a part of their country to secede, especially if the movement to do so was explicitly backed and funded by a foreign power (in the case of HK, the same foreign power that used to occupy that part of the country).

[jhanschoo]

Parent poster's comment unnecessarily villianizes Beijing's stance to the HK situation, but this comment is no better, and is flamewar-baiting.

> just allow a part of their country to secede

Organized HK protestors have a list of five demands and none of them involve secession. The only demand that involves a constitutional-level change is the demand for universal suffrage in HK to the HK government. They are not asking for any expansion of the powers of the HK govt.

> especially if the movement to do so was explicitly backed and funded by a foreign power (in the case of HK, the same foreign power that used to occupy that part of the country).

It is news to me that the UK govt. is expressing support for the aims of the movement beyond emphasizing their generic right to protest. Do you have a source?