[sschueller]

PIX is also better because it gives control back to the central bank (as it was with cash) and not private industry although they are providing the service. The central bank controls what payments are permitted by what laws exist, not some risk management system that has decided that your legal purchase is too risky or some foreign state has applied sanctions against you.

[dataflow]

> The central bank controls what payments are permitted by what laws exist, not some risk management system that has decided that your legal purchase is too risky or some foreign state has applied sanctions against you.

That sounds worse to be honest. You're essentially asking for the government to be not only aware of but also able to control all digital payments. That upends how money has worked over (literally) millenia, and is an incredible risk to take. Giving someone in government the ability to block someone's payments and trusting they won't abuse it might be fine as long as good people remain in power, but do you really want to bet the entire nation's ability to live life on that?

Furthermore, wouldn't determining if a payment is legal require prying into details of the transaction that may violate your privacy? And if they make an incorrect determination based on stuff that really wasn't their business in the first place, they now have the force of government behind them, going far beyond merely declining the transaction.

I would think what you should want to advocate for is a system that cannot block payments (at least domestically) just like with cash, and enforcement either happens prior to enrollment, or after the fact through some other traditional law enforcement mechanism (warrants, etc.).

[dgoldstein0]

Not intending to defend either system but private financial institutions basically end up deputized as enforcement arms of anti money laundering and sanctions in the US and probably other countries where the payments systems are privatized. That's a why every bank has a big compliance department - the laws say a lot about who and what they can serve and they have to be on top of it.

Which yes means sometimes legit transactions that match rules meant to catch money laundering and other shady business get blocked or flagged. Sometimes out of avoidance of legal risk, rather than actual certainly anything illegal is happening.

I don't know if the centralized government implementation would be any better in that regard, but at least you could complain to the government instead of having a bank hide behind a law they didn't write but have to enforce.

[dataflow]

> Not intending to defend either system but private financial institutions basically end up deputized as enforcement arms of anti money laundering and sanctions in the US and probably other countries where the payments systems are privatized.

I feel like people get so distracted by the problems they see with the existing system that they completely miss just how much more dangerous things could get in a centralized government system. For example:

- The current system is distributed and does not let any central entity make the unilateral decision to block any given transaction. Even if you think of banks as deputies of the government, they still differ in how they evaluate and respond to risks, and you have some ability to go to alternative institutions when one of them is wrong. This isn't speculation, it's a fact that already plays out on a daily basis. You cannot do that with your government.

- Flagging a transaction is so incredibly different from blocking it. Flagging is surveillance, blocking is enforcement. It's one thing to get suspicious why I'm getting food at a particular vendor and demand that I explain myself afterward; it's a whole 'nother thing to remotely block me from getting it in the first place.

- Scalability matters. Letting the government be the middleman for all transactions lets the person at the controls block five transactions nearly just as easily as five million of them. Surveillance can get bad enough, yes, but do you really want to give them that much pre-judicial enforcement power too? Because they literally do not have that power currently.

- We had a live demo of what happens when government maintains a record of financial transactions (see the IRS and tax records). Play out what would've happened against a bank - would it have been worse?

[lobocinza]

You can move out of country but for that you need to buy tickets but your cards don't work anymore, your bank accounts are frozen, cash isn't acceptable anymore and digital currency isn't fungible.

[michaelt]

You're right that politicians can pressure private financial institutions into cutting off anyone they don't like. For example Operation Choke Point [1] which cut off legal-but-scandalous businesses' access to the financial system, and getting WikiLeaks debanked for publishing material that made the government look bad.

But some might see that as a sign you need more separation between the state and payment networks, rather than less.

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

[ethbr1]

I think the ideal would be private banks enforcing exact legal rules (no fuzzy matches) and forwarding edge cases to the authorities (but not blocking them). All with transparency.

You don't want private banks in the business of fuzzy-matching (because they'll default to over-cautious, and it empowers the government to exploit grey areas to pressure them).

And you don't want the executive arm of the government too involved in day-to-day financial inspection (because executive can move at the speed of an edict, versus needing a law).

[ricardobeat]

Credit cards, iDeal, SWIFT, Paypal, Venmo, etc are all fully traceable. Anonimity at the protocol level is not a design goal for any of these.

Being worse is debatable: the main difference is the government being able to execute blocking on their own, vs having to convince all banking institutions to do it for them - doesn't sound hard as the govt will always have all the leverage.

Also important to note that BCB (the central bank in Brazil) is autonomous, and technically protected from political influence, thought that ground has been proven shaky.

[lobocinza]

Indeed the issue was leverage. The problem is CDBC. The govs plan is to end money fungibility. Once they get that leverage, MasterCard or central bank is just a detail.

[xinayder]

> That sounds worse to be honest. You're essentially asking for the government to be not only aware of but also able to control all digital payments. That upends how money has worked over (literally) millenia, and is an incredible risk to take. Giving someone in government the ability to block someone's payments and trusting they won't abuse it might be fine as long as good people remain in power, but do you really want to bet the entire nation's ability to live life on that?

There are financial laws that banks must comply with and one of them require banks to share information with the Central Bank about potential fraudulent transactions. Having a payment system using the CB's infrastructure doesn't change anything. They are still required to comply to bank secrecy laws and can only investigate your transactions after obtaining a warrant.

[dataflow]

> There are financial laws that banks must comply with and one of them require banks to share information with the Central Bank about potential fraudulent transactions. Having a payment system using the CB's infrastructure doesn't change anything.

That's just... a completely false assertion on its face? Putting the CB in the middle lets the CB (read: government) proactively block any set of transactions at will, and at scale, before anyone has any chance to litigate or otherwise dispute it. Which literally lets the government entirely cut off any citizen's ability to access the rest of human society. That makes no difference in your eyes vs. post-facto investigation/warrants/etc.?

We saw a live example of this with the IRS too, no? Do you think they would've had just as easy of a time accessing such financial records if they were held by a private entity than by the IRS itself?

[Fokamul]

Worse? Are you serious?

In EU, Czechia. Foreign(french lol) banks are banning accounts because you work in gun manufacturing industry. In EU. When 2 countries from you, there is a FCKIN' war happening.

Only because France, Germany, UK and similar countries are against guns and against self-defense, where your only option is to lay on the ground and let the attacker kill you.

Luckily we can still use guns for self-defense, we can conceal carry by default and we will fight EU laws till our death for this.

(pepper sprays, knives and even katana, whatever. Heh that's a joke, but for real, you can use that without any permit, in theory.)

EU Brusel is trying very hard to force these idiotic laws to every country.

Eg.: they forced limited mags for rifles.

We have bypassed that with local law haha, when you get a gun permit (which is not easy, but not impossible) you just fill a paper with "a gun buy order" for the police and you are by law allowed to have unlimited magazine, silencer and special JHP ammo. Reason self-defense and defense of your property (default reason, police will only check same thing they've checked for gun permit. Your criminal record).

And also luckily we don't need to use anything, because our criminality is a liiiiitle bit lower than France, Germany and UK. You know why.

But tide is changing, Poland will be biggest economy in EU in few years and their gun laws are also changing and we have a lot of common with them.

I believe together with other reasonable countries (Slovakia, Hungary etc.) We will overturn this idiocy comming from France, Germany and other "west" countries.

Btw I'm for EU, even for federalization of EU. But with US approach. EU should be no.1 country, yes country, in the world.

[joe_mamba]

>In EU, Czechia. Foreign(french lol) banks are banning accounts because you work in gun manufacturing industry. In EU. When 2 countries from you, there is a FCKIN' war happening.

That shouldn't be happening. French banks on Czech soil should operate under Czech, not French laws. Otherwise the Czech banking authorities should go after them. Something is fishy about that.

Also, which banks do French citizens working in the arms industry use if they're not allowed to? This is all very bizarre.

[Fokamul]

Yes this is very bizarre.

But this is official story, contractors and employees who worked for Czech arms manufacturer got their personal! accounts disabled.

They had mortgages in these accounts and bank notify them to move mortgage elsewhere.

Reason given by bank, broken internal policy, we cannot disclose which. Goodbye.

https://militarnyi.com/en/news/czech-banks-discriminate-agai...

[joe_mamba]

>Reason given by bank, broken internal policy, we cannot disclose which. Ridiculous.

I'm sure what they did was illegal, the problem with such cases is that even if you take them to court and win, you'll still lose a lot of time, money and stress in the process of fighting a bank in court, while for the bank the lawsuit is just another small business expense.

Centrain industries and businesses tend to act above the law even if they know they're in the wrong simply because the punishments if they get caught are too lax.

That's why I'm a big fan of direct personal accountability. Like the person working at the bank who made the choice to close the accounts should go to jail. Because otherwise nefarious people simply hide behind the accountability shield of a large org where nobody is responsible for anything and accountability is always deflected.

[econ]

Like big tech they may refuse service when they like to (which is crazy)

[dormento]

> Reason given by bank, broken internal policy, we cannot disclose which. Goodbye.

Wow this sucks. One thing I took from this comment (and the previous one), if you allow me to (badly) synthesize is: we might need less policy making and more policy enforcement.

[l23k4]

Why? It's because of enforcement the bank is doing this.

The policies don't prohibit banks from getting rid of risky customers, they actively encourage it.

[hilios]

What is the french owned bank you're referring to? Your article mentions ČSOB (Belgian ownership)and Česká spořitelna (Austrian ownership). The source [1] also mentions issues with Fio bank, which according to Wikipedia has Czech owners. The source also attributes this to ESG rules, rather than supplying weapons to Ukraine. Last year, the European Commission launched a legislative initiative designed to make it easier for arms manufacturers to secure funding, including by clarifying the rules within the ESG framework regarding prohibited weapons.[2] I therefore find it hard to believe that the EU deliberately brought about the incidents described. Regardless of this, I do not consider it sensible to conflate the issues of ‘private gun ownership’ and ‘the financing of arms companies’.

[1]https://zpravy.aktualne.cz/ekonomika/ceska-ekonomika/na-hypo...

[2]https://defence-industry-space.ec.europa.eu/eu-defence-indus...

[l23k4]

Why is this supposed to be surprising? These kinds of customers are a huge compliance burden for the bank, why should the banks keep doing business with customers that most likely cost them money?

[joe_mamba]

Because the Czech branch of the French bank operates under Czech not French laws. French rules don't have jurisdiction in Czechia.

[l23k4]

>In EU, Czechia. Foreign(french lol) banks are banning accounts because you work in gun manufacturing industry. In EU. When 2 countries from you, there is a FCKIN' war happening.

Why do you think this is special? US banks will do this too lmao.

There's not a single serious bank in the world that wouldn't consider this an incredibly high risk industry. The compliance load for banks is incredible, especially if you're selling those weapons internationally.

>Only because France, Germany, UK and similar countries are against guns and against self-defense, where your only option is to lay on the ground and let the attacker kill you.

All EU countries and the UK use pretty much the same wording when it comes to self defense. ECHR limits what the states can allow, Czechia isn't allowed to e.g. pass a law allowing you to shoot anyone who enters your home.

[dormento]

> In EU, Czechia. Foreign(french lol) banks are banning accounts because you work in gun manufacturing industry.

I don't think that's how its supposed to work. So IF you're correct and a French entity of any kind is found breaking current Czech laws, THEN this must be reported and action must be taken against it, no matter the law, no discussions here.

> Only because France, Germany, UK and similar countries are against guns and against self-defense, where your only option is to lay on the ground and let the attacker kill you.

This is a big reduction to the absurd, and unnecessarily inflammatory. I'm no dang, but I would ask you to please refrain from such things, in the name of civil discourse. It could have been dishonestly framed in a number of other ways, for example, "Poland as a country is pro-violence and pro-crime, since they are arguably fond of shooting people". I know this must not be as simple, as "laying on the ground and letting the attacker kill you" does not look like a sound defense strategy. However, gun collecting and sports are not, to me, good reasons for owning firearms. To each their own.

> Luckily we can still use guns for self-defense, we can conceal carry by default and we will fight EU laws till our death for this.

> (pepper sprays, knives and even katana, whatever)

Wow, go Brussels I guess. Hope they can eventually implement the "idiotic laws" that make people unable to kill each other with katanas.

[lobocinza]

The state has the power to cancel a person. If MasterCard denies to service you well at least you can look for a competitor or sue. Anyway digital authoritarianism is inevitable. PIX and this Euro system are steps towards CDBCs.

[jdub]

> Giving someone in government the ability to block someone's payments and trusting they won't abuse it might be fine as long as good people remain in power, but do you really want to bet the entire nation's ability to live life on that?

Banking and finance companies honour foreign government sanctions. Ask Francesca Albanese.

Libertarian comparisons of government and non-government behaviour always devolves into angel counting.

[jeroenhd]

Wero is run by the banks themselves, which are in turn controlled/restricted by the central bank. I don't think there's a meaningful difference on that front.

The European ECB isn't really in a position to directly offer services to people, and relying on every country's central banks to cooperate will take decades.

[underlipton]

The central bank is governed by a direct mandate from the government (and, effectively, the entire population, when dealing with a democracy). Commercial and investment banks are beholden to their board and shareholders. There's a clear conflict of interest in trying to dump a service that should be available to everyone onto a business with narrower concerns.

[jeroenhd]

I have been using iDeal for many years now and have yet to see any of the downsides of it being a product of a commercial bank.

Perhaps it's a difference in banking culture between different countries; I would certainly not put the same trust and faith in a Wero alternative set up by American banks, that's for sure.

Banks are beholden to policy from the central bank and financial authorities. Payment fees are capped, payment processing terms aren't a free-for all, and the power of individual banks is kept in check. The people doe have a voice in all of this, just not in the direct implementation process.

[Fnoord]

You cannot do a chargeback on iDeal, but I don't think that is related to it being a product of commercial banks.

The American companies Mastercard and Visa are subject to American rule of law. In the case of a criminal or authoritarian president, such is an issue. You can see how Russian assets got frozen and SWIFT stopped working for Russia after they did the full scale invasion of Ukraine.

Should the USA invade Greenland, they could stop bank payments done via Mastercard or Visa networks.

So for sovereignty, we are better off without USA. We should also transfer our gold and other assets out of USA, since the country is moving towards fascism.

[worik]

> You cannot do a chargeback on iDeal,

Odd. How is a transaction reversed after a dispute?

[Fnoord]

You can't do that with an iDeal transaction. And it is a reason I (European, preferably using European products) often go for a debitcard instead, using Visa/MC... that, or PayPal. But if you have too many disputes on PayPal, they'll simply close your account.

[econ]

Imagine old Europe counting their own beans. The level of absurdity to outsource it to whomever...

[wslh]

The difference is clearly that banks have a different agenda from central banks.

SWIFT is a cooperative of banks also but it seems that some central banks endeavours are better. BTW Argentina created an innovation back in the early 2000s as a product of a crisis. It was implemented in record time and transfers were immediate back then and improving. It's not run by the central banks though.

[econ]

Bit like Moldova automating government because there simply was no money for armies of overpaid burocrates.

[lnxg33k1]

Wait until you see that ECB is shared between European states central banks that themselves shared between each country commercial banks

The ECB is directly governed by European Union law. Its capital stock, worth €11 billion, is owned by all 27 central banks of the EU member states as shareholders.[6] The initial capital allocation key was determined in 1998 on the basis of the states' population and GDP, but the capital key has been readjusted since.[6] Shares in the ECB are not transferable and cannot be used as collateral.

-- Italian Central bank As of early 2024, the 15 largest shareholders represented slightly over half of the bank's equity, namely UniCredit (5.0 percent), Cassa nazionale di previdenza ed assistenza per gli ingegneri ed architetti liberi professionisti [it] (4.9 percent), Fondazione ENPAM [it] (4.9 percent), Cassa nazionale di previdenza e assistenza forense [it] (4.9 percent), Intesa Sanpaolo (4.9 percent), Cassa nazionale di previdenza e assistenza dei dottori commercialisti [it] (3.7 percent), BPER Banca (3.3 percent), ICCREA Banca (3.1 percent), Generali Italia (3.0 percent), the National Institute for Social Security (3.0 percent), Istituto nazionale per l'assicurazione contro gli infortuni sul lavoro (3.0 percent), Cassa di Sovvenzioni e Risparmio fra il Personale della Banca d'Italia [it] (3.0 percent), Cassa di Risparmio di Asti (3.0 percent), Banca Nazionale del Lavoro (2.8 percent), and Crédit Agricole Italia (2.8 percent). The remaining 49 percent were dispersed among 157 shareholders, mainly banks and banking foundations.[49]

[dadoum]

And that's the whole reason why Wero has been made I think. It's because the ECB wants to advance on their digital euro plans due to sovereignty concerns, and I think this push is to dismiss that argument.

[philipallstar]

That sounds a little authoritarian for many Western countries, I imagine.

[sschueller]

I trust my government (Switzerland) way more to do the thing that is right for the people and the law then some private company that has the primary goal of making money. It doesn't mean that governments don't make mistakes but the primary goal is to serve its people.

That is what government is for in a functioning democracy. A functioning government is of the people for the people.

[7tflutter7]

Trust Switzerland? Protonmail is literally fleeing Switzerland. You now have to upload Government ID to use any online service with more than 5k users!! They are also now requiring backdoors (Article 50a). Literally the end of privacy!

It's honestly depressing no one talks about this, or even knows about this.

[rozap]

[flagged]

[dismalaf]

It's a joke but Visa and Mastercard are American corporations so Americans can feel relatively secure using them. If you live in another developed country, relying on the whims of American entities feels less secure than something subject to the laws of your own country.

[brnt]

American consumers have no democratic control of that duopoly either.

[dismalaf]

They're protected by the laws of their country. Foreigners aren't. That's the point.

Americans corporations have shown they'll just pull out of countries if the law comes down on them too hard.

[lobocinza]

To be fair both are publicly traded and owning shares would give you voting rights.

[CPLX]

Americans are pretty aware that government by large, multinational, unaccountable corporations sucks and has basically all of the downsides of big government without any of the accountability upsides.

American media may be less likely to share that narrative with you. But the actual people figured this out a while ago and they're mad.

[_DeadFred_]

Dang has stated these sorts of comments do not belong on HN news. Discussion of specifics are fine, but nationalist slurs are not.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48100358

Edit: wow, my bad. HN really loves low effort nationalistic slurs as entire comments now.

[array_key_first]

What's the slur here? American? Mind?

I'm American, and I wasn't offended. Because it's true, we actually can't comprehend this because we are the poster child of government via huge corporations. We literally don't know what it's like to have a functioning and trustworthy government handling these things, it's completely foreign to us.

[throwway120385]

If I had the Swiss government instead of the US Federal Government I'd trust it a lot more too.

[unethical_ban]

I assume the concern is more about moving to mandated digital currency where every transaction is tracked by the government, no cash allowed.

[marssaxman]

I hope I get to live in such a place some day.

[JumpCrisscross]

> I trust my government (Switzerland)

I do, too. I’m not sure I trust Brussels.

[surgical_fire]

I certainly trust the EU a lot more than I trust US corporations.

[izacus]

I even trust EU more than the local corrupt country governments.

[JumpCrisscross]

Oh, 100%. But the choice here is between European banks and a state-run Pix equivalent.

[ekianjo]

Do they deserve your trust?

[surgical_fire]

The government? Either the national government or the EU get legitimacy by being democratic instructions. That doesn't mean they get blind faith, it is healthy to scrutinize their actions.

US corporations on the other hand get only my contempt and scorn.

[Lionga]

Considering the head of EZB is a convicted criminal with, lets call it interesting, letters to the convicted criminal Sarkozy I am not sure what is plague and what cholera.

[wsng]

Lagarde is not a convicted criminal. She was convicted for negligence, but this is not a criminal conviction.

[dvfjsdhgfv]

Taken into account than of two convicted criminals, Sarkozy went to prison and will probably be sent there again, whereas Trump is running a big country, I'm pretty sure which is which.

[Fnoord]

Lets see. Gerhard Schroeder, fled to RU. Nicolas Sarkozy, convicted. Silvio Berlusconi, convicted. Geert Wilders, convicted. Slobodan Milošević, convicted. Jean-Marie Le Pen, convicted. Marine Le Pen, convicted.

Donald Trump, convicted (pardoned everyone who attempted a coup on Jan 6 2021).

Victor Orban, surely he'll get convicted.

Benjamin N., Vladimir P.: wanted by ICC.

(This excludes cases like Jan Maršálek / Wirecard fraud / GRU spy. Also, have a peak at all the cleaning Zelenski's government had to do, including in his inner circle.)

Seems we in Europe at least are attempting to uphold the rule of law. I can't say the same for US corporations or US government, given the current administration. That being said... can we stop voting for these narcissistic criminals? Thank you in advance.

[amelius]

> That sounds a little authoritarian for many Western countries, I imagine.

If you ever had your account blocked by Apple or Google, you know exactly why a government is the better option. At least you have the rule of law on your side.

Big companies are the authoritarian situation, not the government.

[PowerElectronix]

It deems to me that the rule of law is easier to apply to third parties than to the government that is in charge of administering it

[amelius]

Not if your government properly implements separation of powers, as is the case in most Western countries.

Yes, I'm aware someone is trying to undermine it in the U.S. currently. That doesn't mean that companies are a safe haven suddenly.

[philipallstar]

The actual separation of powers that's a good idea is that between governments and companies.

[PowerElectronix]

Separation of powers is easy to erode and we are seeing that happening in a lot of western countries. Companies are, of course, never going to be trustworthy, but they at least can go out of business if they go full dystopian.

[amelius]

So how many user accounts should Apple or Google wrongfully close until they go out of business? 1000? 10,000? ...

[mothballed]

This reminds me of how all the drug dealers use USPS because it actually requires a warrant to open the package.

If the government has to enforce banking KYC/AML itself they won't be able to hide behind all the third party fuck-fuck games and they'll get sued into oblivion. I'm sure they'll play the normal federal court and sovereign fuck-fuck games but it would be glorious trying to watch them try to enforce the BSA and Patriot act bullshit while not being able to hide behind the auspice it's just a private bank collecting the data.

[WhrRTheBaboons]

in some countries you can vote for your government and hold it accountable.

[philipallstar]

And your vote basically counts for nothing.

[Nerwesta]

Until such governements have already loopholes to circumvent rules of law, I'm as sad as the next guy but the EU technically has that.

[somewhatgoated]

I guess it comes down to who you would trust more - your own government which you have some control over via elections or some (potentially multinational) corporation which you have exactly zero control over?

[philipallstar]

It's the other way around. You have choice with a company, and people can switch provider very quickly if they are bad. You have very, very coarse-grained control with the government every few years.

[applfanboysbgon]

> You have choice with a company, and people can switch provider very quickly if they are bad.

There are exactly two companies in the global credit card market and they operate in lockstep, literally coming to agreements to shut down legal businesses together. Visa and MasterCard have absolutely no right to determine who is and isn't allowed to receive payment. Governments have that right, but that doesn't mean they should use it -- if they're abusing that right, people can vote them out. The effectiveness of people voting out harmful politicians is another matter, but that's kind of on the people being bad at voting, not the idea of government altogether, and at any rate you have no vote whatsoever in what MC/Visa do (unless you vote for government to regulate them!).

[deaux]

> You have choice with a company,

This is wrong for a large share of the companies that most people deal with on a daily basis. And that share has been steadily increasing every single year.

[bildung]

Ok, I choose to not use Visa/Mastercard in the US, and I want to subscribe to some saas. What do I do now? Or do you mean "choice" as in "you can always choose not the breathe or eat"?

[CobaltFire]

To be pedantic American Express and Discover exist.

But I agree with your meaning. We are beholden to some third party no matter how we move in the current situation.

[ravenstine]

I've found it funny how many people still believe that most places in the US don't take Discover. I almost exclusively use my Discover card and the number of times I've had it declined is a tiny fraction of a percent. Most people also don't seem to realize that Discover is also a bank, so you can use it for both credit and checking/savings. So yeah, you likely don't have to be forced to use the duopoly of Visa and Mastercard. The only time I've recently used one of my Visa cards was when I visited Europe where I found much more places don't accept Discover, although there were still many that did.

Hopefully the acquisition of Discover by Capital One results in lower processing fees so the network broadens globally and makes the notion that Discover isn't viable a thing of the past.

[Forgeties79]

Amex is regularly rejected by businesses and cannot be your only credit card, so really you maybe have Discover.

I also wouldn’t say either of those is particularly better than Visa/Mastercard. They all engage in the same practices more or less

[throwaway2037]

Why is this downvoted? While slightly sarcastic, you make a good point.

Is it possible to get a UnionPay (China) or JCB (Japan) credit card issued by a European bank? That would be very interesting. I assume in the last 10 years, there is way more acceptance of UnionPay in Europe. UnionPay is widely accepted all over East and South East Asia these days because there are so many Chinese tourists.

[vrganj]

I've moved countries five times in my life. I still haven't been able to fully get rid of my dependency on Big Tech or the Visa/Mastercard duopoly.

[delfinom]

You only have a potential choice until a company buys out all its competitors and surpresses the rest.

[array_key_first]

Theres a natural tension here, because in order for this to be true you need a diverse market with many competitors. But that is bad usually, because it's extremely inefficient, so it gets optimized out. The monopolies we see are indeed an optimization - the natural climax of a developing market.

Consider payments: you do not want to carry around 100 different cards and trinkets just to pay for things in your daily life, right? And for merchants, they do not want to make deals with 100 different companies to accept payments, right? So what's the end result?

We see the monopolies in the US economy because our economy is very efficient. It could be even more efficient - consider, for example, how much time and money could be saved if only one phone OS existed.

But then of course that's bad for you, the consumer, because then these huge corporations rule your life and can essentially do whatever they want.

[NalNezumi]

In the context of mastercard and visa being a duopoly and the recent debacle such as certain games being removed from steam because they threatened to not allow stream to use the card payment system, it's a pretty bad take.

Not that central bank won't be able to do the same, but it would have to follow laws set by the government rather than law+whatever the card companies decide to.

[ambicapter]

Agree to disagree. Lock-in is a thing that companies design for.

[philipallstar]

And a government is pre-locked in.

[somewhatgoated]

Like others said that choice is not really given in this case.

Also with the government option it wouldn’t mean that you can’t still use other methods - for example in brasil credit card or cash work just fine, PIX is just one (very convenient) option.

[throwaway2037]

Do corner stores (small informal convenience stores) in Brasil usually accept PIX? I assume they all cash-only.

Also: What is PIX uptake/penetration like in the countryside? China is shocking how fast that countryside wet/farmer's markets started accepting AliPay. Literally, you can buy a kilo of pumpkin (namguo) using nothing but your mobile phone with AliPay, and the old lady running the stand (in a wet market) probably has a 6th grade education. (No hate on that!)

[dormento]

(Brazilian here).

> Do corner stores (small informal convenience stores) in Brasil usually accept PIX? I assume they all cash-only.

Pretty much every single one I've always been to. From the smallest one-person street corner popup shop to the biggest shopping mall boutique and outlets, virtually everyone accepts PIX payments. Its just better - its one of those "you gotta use it to understand" things.

Anecdotally: I've even gave some cash to homeless people on occasion using PIX. This may seem weird, but in Brazil, you must have a bank account to be able to subscribe to any sort of government benefits, and since its free, pretty much everyone has an account and therefore can receive PIX payments. Its also safer, since you're not carrying cash with you, and even if you're somehow forced to transfer, there are ways to monitor and reverse transactions (so called MED).

https://www.bcb.gov.br/estabilidadefinanceira/pix-seguranca

Of course, there's been a few incidents over the years where some concerned citizens would not accept PIX payments because "the government will know what you're spending on" (in contrast to, say, credit card operators, where apparently the "right people" would know what you're spending on...).

There are some criticisms of the current system, which is fair, but most that I have heard are ideological in nature or some sort of foreign defaultism.

[snovv_crash]

In Africa they've had this since ~2005 with the Mpesa system. It basically transfers cellphone credits as payment. In certain regions everyone with a dumb phone was hooked up and you could do anything from buy a coconut from a guy on the side of the road to pay your taxi driver to pay at the supermarket.

[carlos_rpn]

Replying here to throwaway2037 because I can't reply directly to him, but yes, even most informal businesses accept PIX, including some random guy selling candy or bottled water at a stop signal.

The only exception I have found to consistently refuse PIX are some parking lots, and they refuse credit cards as well, accepting only cash, probably to hide their earnings.

[surgical_fire]

> You have choice with a company, and people can switch provider very quickly

Oh yeah?

Please enlihhten me, how exactly can I switch providers from the Visa/Mastercard duopoly?

[vanjoe]

Duopoly is bad. We should work to fix that. A monopoly is worse.

[moralestapia]

Brazil is on the West, fyi.

[dragontamer]

The new alignment isnt East vs West... But North vs Global South, which Brazil sees itself a part of the South.

[moralestapia]

???

Wrong thread?

The comment I see reads like this:

"That sounds a little authoritarian for many Western countries, I imagine."

[Nerwesta]

Yeah the concept of "Western" is a relic of the Cold war, just like Western Europe / Eastern Europe ( past some countries being genuinely there ) It's still taught like that to younger people, but definitely shouldn't.

[dvfjsdhgfv]

> The new alignment isnt East vs West... But North vs Global South, which Brazil sees itself a part of the South.

Where's Russia and Australia then?

[dragontamer]

And Cuba was in the West during the Cold war. We knew what East vs West meant, it's more a figurative phrase than anything.

Today's alignment is shaping up to be North and South. Not quite 'versus' like the Cold war was.

[gloosx]

on the West of what? Culturally and historically it's a Western country, yes, but politically and economically it's an Eastern country – founding member of BRICS and a developing economy. I think the author of the parent comment used "Western" term referring to ideological and economic grouping

[bee_rider]

I think the idea of what’s authoritarian sounding is more of a cultural/historical/ideological distinction, not something that would naturally map to an economic label like BRICS.

Also Western and Eastern are just labels in this context, not opposite directions, even if Brazil was “not Western” in some way, it wouldn’t make sense to call it Eastern.

[aipatselarom]

>on the West of what?

On the West of every single country in Europe, to start with.

Don't take this the wrong way, but have you looked at a world map? I ask since a significant chunk of people from the US cannot find Mexico on a map ...

Aside from its very evident geographic location, Brazil was the site of the first lasting European colony in the Americas established by Portugal.

People in Brazil speak Portuguese[1], a Romance language derived from Latin and closely related to Spanish, French and Italian.

The genetic lineages most commonly found within the Brazilian population include Portuguese, Spanish, French, Italian, Dutch, German, and to a much lesser degree but still significant, Lebanese and Turkish [2].

The top countries whose citizens visit Brazil as tourists are overwhelmingly from the Americas and Europe: Argentina, the USA, Chile, Paraguay, Uruguay, France, Portugal, Germany, Italy and the UK.

Likewise, when Brazilians travel abroad, their main destinations are Argentina, the USA, Chile, Portugal, France, Italy, Uruguay, the Caribbean, Spain and the UK.

Share of exports to Asia: ~41%

Share of exports to the Americas and Europe combined: ~47%

Share of imports from Asia: ~43%

Share of imports from the Americas and Europe combined: ~50%

How could one reach the conclussion that Brazil is an "Eastern" country? Oh yeah, they joined a trade organization with China and Russia ... sure, they must be Eastern now.

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portuguese_language

2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_and_ethnicity_in_Brazil

[applfanboysbgon]

> very evident geographic location

I agree that Brazil is Western, because it obviously is; it's a former European colony that speaks a European language and has European religious and cultural values. But geography has nothing to do with the concept of "Westernness", beyond historical etymology. Australia and New Zealand are as much part of "the West" as Canada is.

[n0um3n4]

i recently got interviewed by company in the UK. The Operations Chief thought Mexico was in Spain... jeez.

[throwaway2037]

    > I ask since a significant chunk of people from the US cannot find Mexico on a map ...

I love these comments. Don't worry: A "significant chunk of people" from Europe also cannot find Mexico on a map. Really, these comments say nothing. They are like "man on the street with a microphone" gotchas. Anybody under 30 years old has a mobile phone with Internet: They open their maps app, and search for Mexico. Done: Borders the southwestern United States.

[surgical_fire]

West is just the US nowadays.

[Filligree]

I would say West is Europe, Japan and a few others. But I think I need a new word for that one.

[philipallstar]

The West is UK, Western Europe, Australia, Canada, US, Scandinavia. I agree that Japan is a really interesting one that shares a lot with the West, but doesn't have the same cultural roots. I wouldn't be opposed if they wanted to be counted as part of the West, but I don't know if they would.

[surgical_fire]

Ehh, I live in Europe. Moving forward I don't think it makes sense to bundle it with the US, who is like the biggest threat to the EU, considering the past few years.

[Nerwesta]

That was said exactly when that guy first came years ago. I'll bet my money ( via Wero or not ) the whole movement will be shattered by an " European-friendly " governement. Perhaps private companies will still retain a bad sentiment, who knows, everything else will be business as usual.

[RobotToaster]

The choice is between the ECB and visa/mastercard (who are de-facto controlled by the US government).

It's a shit situation we're in, but the ECB seems like the lesser evil.

[VerifiedReports]

Especially now in the (former) USA.