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Here we go again. Following yesterday’s IT meltdown that messed up some people’s travel plans and caused millions to literally starve to death in Tesco because they had no cash to buy food. The Cash Is King brigade are back.
The Cash Is King brigade are essentially the same people who think that Covid was a hoax, that Donald Trump won the last US presidential election, that the world is secretly controlled by lizards, as well as being controlled by a deep state. That’s why there is a deep state conspiracy to brainwash everyone into paying for everything digitally instead of by cash. All well and good, except that it isn’t.
Anyway, here’s a years old post doing the rounds again on social media:
‘This is why I keep telling the younger generation to stop avoiding cash!!! ……
Why should we pay cash everywhere with banknotes instead of a card ?
– I have a £50 banknote in my pocket. Going to a restaurant and paying for dinner with it.
The restaurant owner then uses the note to pay for the laundry.
The laundry owner then uses the note to pay the barber.
The barber will then use the note to pay for shopping.
After an unlimited number of payments, it will still remain a £50 value, which has fulfilled its purpose to everyone who used it for payment and the bank has jumped dry from every cash payment transaction made.
BUT
IF I go to a restaurant and pay digitally via Card,
– the bank fees for my payment transaction charged to the seller are 3%, so around £1.50
( and so will be the fee of £1.50 for each further payment transaction )
-for the owner re laundry or
– payments of the owner of the laundry shop,
– or payments of the barber etc…..
Therefore, after 30 transactions, the initial £50 will exist at only £5, and the remaining £45 has become the property of the bank … thanks to all of the digital transactions and fees!
Use it or lose it folks…
Once it’s gone we won’t get it back!
Cash is king! #cashisking’
We don’t know who ‘I’, who appears as the fourth word into the post, is, but he, assuming he is a he and not a she, is telling the younger generation to stop avoiding cash. The implication is that he is older and wiser than the younger generation and so comes up with a half-cocked series of analogies as to how great cash is. For starters, I strongly disagree with any suggestion that the ‘younger generation’ are somehow doing things wrong.
It would be stretching things to suggest that I am anywhere near the younger generation but I have not, apart from when there is no alternative, used cash for anything. I never carry cash around me, I am delighted that I no longer have to carry cash, and particularly bulky, filthy coins which for a part of their lives have resided near various gentlemen’s urine stained penises. I don’t prefer digital transactions because the deep state has told me to. It’s just easier.
I accept that bank charges are a pain in the arse for small businesses. I would prefer it if the fees weren’t there at all or at least were greatly reduced, but hey ho, we choose to live in a country where banks, though regulated, can charge what are often exorbitant fees for services. And guess what? Banks charge businesses who use cash, too. It’s not so much the digital payment system that’s at fault: it’s the banks who are fleecing people.
The most important thing about the above scenario is this: is it true? A simple search via Mr Google suggests it’s bollocks. Here is one example. There are plenty more and the indication is that this is yet another example of people sharing something because it’s on the internet and it must, therefore, be true.
Use it or lose it folks…Once it’s gone we won’t get it back! Cash is king! ends the post and that’s what you see with all this bonkers conspiracy websites and Facebook groups. And it’s true. If people stop using cash – and I can’t think of a single reason why people should carry on using it – it will disappear. The Bank of England has stated clearly that for as long as people prefer to use cash, there will always be cash, so don’t worry.
The bloke that runs the crank-infested Cash Is King:Worldwide could use your financial assistance so if you feel strongly enough, why not send him some cash? Except that he doesn’t accept cash, you have to pay him via the digital system. Hmm. Nothing dodgy going on there, then.
The best response I have seen to this viral post, which by the way, is several years old, was this:
‘The restaurant owner can’t pay cash to the laundry because the laundry firm’s driver isn’t allowed to take cash! It’s too simplistic, the restaurant owner won’t be taking his laundry to the local laundrette and feeding cash into a machine!. Likewise the restaurant owner will pay his suppliers by bacs as again the van drivers don’t take cash, nor does his insurers, utility providers, accountant, solicitor, etc. It only works on a very small scale which is trivial in the bigger picture. It also leads to huge tax evasion.’
Criminals, drug users, tax dodgers and many other … ahem … upstanding citizens will always prefer to pay, or be paid, in cash and I know that many people prefer cash because it’s what they’ve always used and it’s what they’re comfortable with. Live and let live, I say, but save me from Cash Is King because, frankly, it isn’t. It’s just a less convenient way to pay for something, that’s all.
