Interesting Links for 19-02-2020

[andrewducker]

Sabisky isn't the problem. Cummings is.

(tags:fascism UK politics )

7000-year-old well is the oldest wooden structure ever discovered

(tags:prehistory wood archeology )

An optical illusion to make your brain ache

(tags:illusion )

The UK cash economy close to collapse

(tags:cash money banking UK payments )

Sexist Ideologies May Help Cultivate The "Dark Triad" Of Personality Traits

(tags:personality sexism patriarchy )

On the power of names, and the invoking of entities on social media

(tags:names technology socialnetworking )

The books of your life

(tags:life comic funny )

Comments

Sabisky, Cummings and Their Fellow-Travellers Across the Planet

[dewline]

Again: damn all fascism. We've had too much of it across the generations.

[cmcmck]

They both are.

One has gone and the other needs to go!

But the blond bombshell stays in the bunker and sends out 'spokeperson said' in his stead.

He did it again this morning!

[calimac]

I think one reason that the US is not about to become a cashless society is credit card fees, which are a burden on small businesses. I often see signs posted saying no credit cards below a certain size of bill, which used to be $10 but I now often see $25. That's somewhat more than the price of two lunches at a typical Chinese restaurant around here, a species where the sign is common, so most of their lunch customers are going to pay cash.

Are such fees not a burden in the UK? I haven't on visits had the experience of being expected to pay on the order of £1 for a candy bar with a credit card in a corner shop, but then I haven't been to the UK in two years and things are changing fast.

[andrewducker]

The EU banned charging customers credit card fees in 2018, and limited the fees charged to small businesses to 0.3% back in 2015.

[zz]

for our pub of choice, apparently for a few years now the bank fees for handling cash have been higher than the card fees. and i suspect that's only going to get worse.

[calimac]

Charging credit card fees to customers is usually prohibited around here too. Amusingly, giving discounts for cash is not prohibited, and is commonly found at the pumps of vehicle fueling stations. The difference is, this way they're not secretly socking credit card users with an extra fee.

Fees to merchants are a lot higher in the US. A lot higher. Always over 1% and sometimes over 3%. This includes things like the impact of monthly service fees as well as per-transaction fees.

[calimac]

Bank fees for handling cash? I don't think we have those in the US at all. Certainly I've never been charged anything for even the most elaborate cash exchange. But for that reason most banks refuse to do any cash dealings with people who don't have accounts there, even to giving change.

[andrewducker]

There are places which don't take cards. But they seem to be really rare nowadays. And the banks charge small businesses for depositing cash too (around 1% from a quick Google).

[andrewducker]

Personal accounts are fine. Businesses get charged for cash handling.

[doug]

Agree that places that don't take cards are getting rarer. Sometimes it feels like they're now as unusual as places which do normally take cards but don't right now because the system is down or their terminal is broken or something, but I'm sure not. I do think that they are getting close in frequency to the number of places that *only* take cards.

From what I can make out, the charges for small UK retailers are considerably smaller for taking card payments than cash. This has been drive by new market entrants like Square who are trying to build market share by offering card handling facilities to small businesses at rates below what the big traditional banks offer, which has put downward pressure on what those banks are able to charge. The new banking people aren't building the massive infrastructure to handle cash, though, because that really doesn't scale the way that card payments do, and also is very obviously a declining market. And a declining market means reduced efficiencies which makes it more expensive.

From a small business point of view, going card-only is a huge labour saver and a big risk reducer. Cashing up at the end of the day is no longer a nightmare of physically counting up notes but can be done with a few clicks - and you are free from the regular nightmare of the cash and the register not balancing, which is horrible for everyone and time-consuming. And the owner can go straight home instead of having to bag up the cash (after separating off and accounting for the float for tomorrow) and take it to the night safe at their bank. And there is no till to act as a target for theives to steal. One restaurant on my High St went card-only after a bloke went in to a neighbouring business in broad daylight and ran off with the cash. And more than a few small businesses have had problems with light-fingered staff, alas. Finally, you are at substantially less risk of having all your assets frozen while the coppers investigate you for possible money laundering. This is, admittedly, a small risk in the first place, but not quite so much in some lines of business.

The effect on the consumer is frustrating, though, and tough on people without bank accounts and who struggle with online stuff. I met an older, slow-moving bloke at a cashpoint yesterday who was trying to get in to a local bank branch that was closed until Friday to 'cash a cheque'. He didn't think he had access to the cashpoint; I expect he technically did but he certainly didn't know his PIN. Even for someone tech-savvy like me it's a pain: I need to carry cards *and* cash to be sure. And sometimes contactless works and sometimes it doesn't, so my phone won't do as a card substitute.

[naath]

And handling cash is free? (unless you have a net zero cash flow you will have to schlep it to/from the bank, which might charge; you have to store it securely; you have to count it carefully). Also cash is grubby, apparently often with drugs; so it's not exactly nice.

I routinely buy 70p coffee with my phone (card on phone is actually a debit card) at work (UK). I am not sorry at all, my hands don't work good and dealing with coins is a nightmare. Personally I think places advertising 'no cash' is a nice vengeance on the kind of people who say 'no cards'; but this might not be a good basis for policy.

[calimac]

Yes, handling cash is free: at least as far as I know, and at least around here. Maybe not in the UK, but the local small merchants here in the US whom I know complain bitterly about credit card fees. I've never heard them complain about cash. Again, the world in the UK may be very different. But then there's Germany, which I found startlingly low in the ability to use credit cards even 30 years ago, and which according to what I've read hasn't changed much since.

[naath]

The safe is free? the staff time to count money is free? the cash registers are free? no, cash is not free, everyone is just so used to paying the costs they can't see them. Then again if the bank charges are too high on cards then obviously cards can still cost more; UK card fees havne collapsed, London buskers have card readers.

[andrewducker]

I did a quick check, and Bank of America (first one I checked) charges 30cents per $100 of cash deposited after the first $7000.
https://www.bankofamerica.com/smallbusiness/resources/fees-at-a-glance.go

[calimac]

How interesting, then, that - as I said - I've never heard any merchants here in the US complain about this, but they complain vociferously about credit card fees, asking their customers to avoid using credit cards if they can. Whereas I gather that in the UK the cash fees are higher than the credit card fees, which makes for a very different situation. The point is, the situations are different. (And then there's Germany, as I also noted.)

[andrewducker]

Yeah, clearly different circumstances!