[vxNsr]

I actually don't understand people who regularly use atms.

If you have access to a bank account then it's not too difficult to get a credit card and in terms of security a CC is much easier to control than a bunch of little pieces of paper.

If the plastic gets stolen or lost you can just cancel it and lose nothing except time (and waiting for a new card to arrive) while with cash you lose it or it gets stolen -- it's gone.

Just to be clear - a credit card should only be used as a debit card, using it like free money is only lying to yourself.

[thedufer]

The reason I specified NYC is that it (along with other large cities) contains a number of small businesses that don't take credit cards. Your suggestions sounds good in practice, but there are a number of services I would lose or have to travel significantly farther for were I to refuse to carry cash. Cash is also the easiest way to split checks (most restaurants won't split checks more than N ways, for some N <= 3) and I frequently eat out in large groups.

[makeset]

A good number of popular small restaurants in NYC are cash-only. And then there's splitting the bill with large groups, where you don't want to (or can't) add yet another card to the pile, especially if you're not splitting evenly. Also, if you drive, gas stations charge 5-10% more for credit cards.

[sgarman]

In SF half the places I go only take cash - so it's not always an option to use credit. Wish it was though.