[mcv]

But that's the point: people will not be able to buy a loaf of bread if they don't meet with the system's approval.

Look, I switched to completely contactless payment through my phone since Covid, and it's so convenient I'm not going back. And it's hard for me to imagine people who don't have access to a bank account or smartphone, but those people do exist, and they may eventually become unable to buy a loaf of bread, and that's a problem.

[cmroanirgo]

Due to government tactics, a lot of australians are now deliberately using cash a) for the privacy b) as a statement against orwellian mechanisms.

I find it really sad when people are blaise about something that once gone, can't be put back. A social credit system, & everyone talking about it as an inevitable thing, have already bought into the propaganda.

I find it inevitable that with sentiments like that, that i'll be forced to live in a car & eventually the gutter & arrested regularly because of my nuisance factor. All because of the convenience.

[imtringued]

There are anonymous payment services. Just mandate the use of those in the laws.

[perf1]

Is this meant as a joke? Because almost the whole world is working on outlawing or "regulating" these and they aren't even anonymous most of the time. Not being controlled and centralized is threatening enough.

[mdp2021]

> anonymous payment services

Could you please expand? In this area, the only ones available I found have a surcharge of ~5..10% (you buy a 100€ card through 105€..110€). Note: I am not certain of the amount, it has been a while since I used one.

And in Europe electronic payments cannot by law be anonymous over 150€.

[imtringued]

>But that's the point: people will not be able to buy a loaf of bread if they don't meet with the system's approval.

...

Seriously, your argument is that privacy violations will cause people to starve? not the fact that there is a currency monopoly and you can't issue your own currency and start your own regional economy from scratch if the currency is concentrated in the hands of rich people and hence cannot be used and you must constantly borrow new money into the system which eventually gets saved by the rich forcing you to go to the bank and ask them permission over and over again? The dystopia you are imagining is already there. The only thing you're losing is privacy which is solved by GNU Taler.

[MiguelX413]

That is not that they're arguing at all, they are arguing that those who are locked out of the system by the government or banks or corporations will be starved by a cashless system. They would either be locked out by not having a bank account or device to participate in the system with, or by having their accounts suspended.

[soco]

Were you able before to issue your own currency and start your own regional economy from scratch? Where and when?

[mcv]

Local alternative currency systems[0] have existed for a long time in many cities. They're small and fringe, but they exist. Amsterdam, for example, has NOPPES[1]. But these systems are not threatened by electronic payment systems.

[0] LETSysteem, or Local Exchange Trading System

[1] https://noppes.nl