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Thursday, December 01, 2016

The War On Cash Is Happening Faster Than We Could Have Imagined

Every time we turn around, it seems, there’s another major assault in the War on Cash.

India is the most notable recent example– the embarrassing debacle a few weeks ago in which the government, overnight, “demonetized” its two largest denominations of cash, leaving an entire nation in chaos.

But there have been so many smaller examples.

In the US city of New Orleans, the local government decided earlier this month to stop accepting cash payments from drivers at the Office of Motor Vehicles.

As I wrote to you recently, several branches of Citibank in Australia have stopped dealing in cash altogether.

And former US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers published an article last week stating that “nothing in the Indian experience gives us pause in recommending that no more large notes be created in the United States, Europe, and around the world.”

In other words, despite the India chaos, Summers thinks we should still curtail the $100 bill.

The conclave of the high priests of monetary policy almost invariably sings the same chorus: only criminals and terrorists use high denominations of cash.

Ken Rogoff, Harvard professor and former official at the International Monetary Fund and Federal Reserve, recently published a book blatantly entitled The Curse of Cash.

Ben Bernanke’s called it a “fascinating and important book”.

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7 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm just glad the stock market is raging forward and the dollar is higher than it has been for a long time.Aren't you all happy to hear that good news? All because of our incoming President.

Anonymous said...

They have to eliminate cash in order to totally control us.
It is just that simple.

Once cash is gone, we will literally be controlled in every way.
They will be able to track everything we do and buy.

We live in a TOTALITARIAN DICTATORSHIP.

Anonymous said...

I am not a Drug dealer Terrorist or any other type of criminal and I like having cash and dealing in cash. You get a lot better deals with cash on services and even buying some things. They took away some denominations and now they want to take away the $100 and $50. This is just another way the Government will control us. They want to know everything about us and if you only deal with Bank / C/C they know everything you own. They want to indoctrinate and control all aspects of our lives. This is Communism.

Anonymous said...

I saw this coming when, many years ago, AT&T added a surcharge at their walk-in stores FOR USING CASH!
I thought the guy was kidding when he told me about the surcharge.
I asked, of course, why there would EVER be a surcharge for using cash, and he explained that it covers "the extra handling of cash".
This world is getting nuts.

Anonymous said...

And I got behind a man at the counter of a Royal Farms store this morning that took 5 minutes to pay for a soda, using some kind of electronic transaction. For a SODA! Nothing else. It's pathetic. Like the commercial, What's in his wallet? Apparently no money, just plastic. When all money is nothing but an electronic transaction, we will literally have no money. It will just be data on a computer server somewhere. Try to get it if access is denied; like by the IRS, or any other government entity. How about a shutdown of the internet, or a hack of your "electronic money" that leaves you without any electronic funds? You can go from well off to flat broke in the blink of an eye, in a cashless society. That Harvard elitist professor, in his ivory tower, can't proclaim that he knows what is best for us. He is an over-educated stooge.

Anonymous said...

I once had a newly hired clerk at Sears tell me that he had to go get a supervisor when I told him I was paying with cash. He didn't know how to process a cash transaction. He knew how to do a credit transaction, but not a cash one. How sad....and this was a number of years ago.

Anonymous said...

Hang on to your cash folks! When economic calamity strikes again (and it will) those who hold cash will have the advantage over all others. The ones who not only survived the great depression on the 1930s, but actually made the best purchases of assets, had the cash to do it. All the ones with "money" in the banks, that they couldn't get to, were the ones who became so desperate that they would sell their homes and farms for a pittance of their worth to anyone that had cash. They and their families had to eat and had to find a way to survive. Without money, they could not even buy food. The ones with cash (not "money" in the bank), were the most powerful of all, back then. Today, you can put all the money you want in the bank, but try to take it out. They will give you a check, a piece of paper, not money back. Money in, paper, funny money, back. Doesn't anyone wonder where all the actual money that is deposited in banks goes to? It goes back to the feds to be destroyed. If a bank pays out any cash, it has to be "ordered" from the Fed in the form of new bills. If you are trying to get a large sum of your money from a bank, they will make you wait for the "order" to come in. Banks are the ones that would really like to see a cashless society. Not Me!