NYC Politician Wants To Ban Cashless Restaurants (eater.com) 636
If New York City Council Member Ritchie J. Torres has his way, the growing trend of cashless restaurants -- establishments that accept payment only in plastic and digital forms -- will be snuffed out. From a report: Torres plans to introduce legislation before his fellow city council members that, if passed, would levy fines on any local businesses that refused to accept paper currency. "I started coming across coffee shops and cafes that were exclusively cashless and I thought: But what if I was a low-income New Yorker who has no access to a card?" he says in a Q&A with Grub Street. "I thought about it more and realized that even if a policy seems neutral in theory, it can be racially exclusionary in practice. Therein lies the problem with card-only policies. I see it as a way to gentrify the marketplace."
Torres believes the cashless business model is inherently classist and racist, as it excludes anyone who might not be able to afford smartphones loaded with digital currency such as Apple Pay or qualify for credit cards, let alone the roughly 22 million Americans who do not have bank accounts. "If you're intent on a cashless business model, it will have the effect of excluding lower-income communities of color from what should be an open and free market," he tells Grub Street. In 2009 Wall Street Journal story, Tony Zazula, co-owner of now-shuttered Commerce in New York City, explained, pretty much, yes, that's right.
Torres believes the cashless business model is inherently classist and racist, as it excludes anyone who might not be able to afford smartphones loaded with digital currency such as Apple Pay or qualify for credit cards, let alone the roughly 22 million Americans who do not have bank accounts. "If you're intent on a cashless business model, it will have the effect of excluding lower-income communities of color from what should be an open and free market," he tells Grub Street. In 2009 Wall Street Journal story, Tony Zazula, co-owner of now-shuttered Commerce in New York City, explained, pretty much, yes, that's right.
Pre-paid cards? (Score:3, Interesting)
Umm, you can stroll down to your local Walmart, Dollar Store, Gas Station and trade your cash for a pre-paid "credit-card" anytime. You can reload that card too. So even if you don't have good enough credit to get a credit card you could go this route.
Lets not even address the elephant in the room, of in modern society you just need a credit card and internet for that matter to function, so if you do not have these items you need to come up with a work around. Like above.
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Re: Pre-paid cards? (Score:2)
Not always. I know several people who no longer qualify for bank accounts.
Mainly because they bounced a couple of checks and the bank closed the account due to them not paying the bank back yet.
Digging yourself out of that hole, is a multi year process and can only be done through the orginial bank.
Yes they can't buy stuff online either. Or get loans for cars etc.
However if you are that bad with money you aren't going to be walking NYC going to coffee shops either. You will be pan handling for cash.
Re:Pre-paid cards? (Score:5, Insightful)
Umm, you can stroll down to your local Walmart, Dollar Store, Gas Station and trade your cash for a pre-paid "credit-card" anytime. You can reload that card too.
What is the typical fee to obtain the sort of card you describe, to keep the card active for each month, and to add money? If there is a flat fee to add any amount of money, for example, then someone who has access to only small amounts of cash at a time will have to pay the fee more often, and therefore pay a larger percentage of what is added as fees.
Re:Pre-paid cards? (Score:4, Interesting)
Eventually the debt they represent becomes a substantial percentage of the company's annual cash flow. Many accounting calculations and decisions are based on the amount of debt a company has, so after enough time this begins to affect the company's ability to, for example, qualify for a loan. These types of accounting decisions are made under the assumption "what if all your creditors ask you to suddenly repay your debt all at once?" Never mind that such a scenario is virtually impossible for lost cash card debt, the ease with which you can make such a calculation makes it an important tool in financing. The company would love to just return the cash it's holding on behalf of the cardholder to wipe the debt off its books, but it has no way to contact the cardholder because he purchased it at a gas station at 2 am paying for it and a pack of cigarettes with cash.
So to prevent this debt from staying on the books in perpetuity, they add recurring fees which will gradually whittle it away if you take too long to use the card. Generally the first year or two are free. Thereafter $1-$3 is deducted each month. In that way, if the card is lost, the debt disappears from the company's books before it becomes big enough to become a problem. Airlines had to do the same thing with their frequent flyer miles. People were dying without using their miles, and those miles were building up in their accounting books as debt which they may have to repay in the future (maybe a court would decide a person's children could use those miles). So they altered their frequent flyer programs to make your miles expire if unused after x years.
Re:Pre-paid cards? (Score:5, Insightful)
Or, and I'm just spitballing here, one could simply use the cash they have in hand rather than jump through hoops.
I realized the KISS principle isn't valued any more, but oddly enough, simple is usually better.
Re:Pre-paid cards? (Score:4, Interesting)
Or, and I'm just spitballing here, one could simply use the cash they have in hand rather than jump through hoops.
That doesn't eliminate the costs. The proposed rule just uses coercive government to force the cost onto someone else. Handling cash is slower and more labor intensive, can be pocketed by dishonest employees, and makes the vendor a target for robbery. So the owner can either eat the loss, or push the cost onto the customer via higher prices.
I realized the KISS principle isn't valued any more, but oddly enough, simple is usually better.
More laws micromanaging how businesses operate is not an example of KISS.
Re: Pre-paid cards? (Score:2)
One of my young co-workers got a Discover secured card to establish a credit rating, and they upgraded him to a real card and gave him his deposit back after a few months. No credit rating doesn't mean you can't get a decent credit card.
Convenience vs necessity (Score:2, Insightful)
Umm, you can stroll down to your local Walmart, Dollar Store, Gas Station and trade your cash for a pre-paid "credit-card" anytime.
Of course but you think there are a lot of Walmarts and gas stations in Manhattan [ny1.com]? I'm sure there are alternatives where you can get a pre-paid debit card but it sure as hell is a lot less convenient than carrying the cash that is already in your wallet. Furthermore there is a cost to doing that. Time, fuel, financing charges (the cards aren't free), etc.
Lets not even address the elephant in the room, of in modern society you just need a credit card and internet for that matter to function
That's not even remotely true. I have had dozens of people work for me who do not have credit cards and a few of them have pretty much zero interest in
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Is forcing shops to use physical money free?
They don't go cashless out of idealism, it saves them money and thus it saves their customers money. If you force cost on them most their customers will be worse off and we all struggle. Not as much as the average Yemenite obviously, just more or less first world struggles.
Cash payments should always be available (Score:5, Interesting)
SImply as a last resort - if you're lost your wallet or phone you can always borrow some cash whereas not many people will let you borrow their cards!
Plus sometimes its nice to be able to pay anonymously and not always be tracked by some financial organisation by using their services.
Once cash is gone then the banks + Apple really will be the ones in charge or your life. There'll be no anonymity and if the bank suspends your account then you won't even be able to buy a coffee never mind pay your rent. All the millenials rushing to ditch cash and thinking its yesterdays payment system might want to think about that for a moment especially given how hot they are on privacy and anonymity elsewhere.
Re:Cash payments should always be available (Score:5, Interesting)
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Fuck those paranoid individuals that need to know exactly where you are at any time.
It's not paranoia. It's a lucrative business where companies buy up this information and then target ads exclusively to you based on your spending habits.
The problem is consumerism. Not some kind of 1984 wet-dream-come-true.
Re:Cash payments should always be available (Score:5, Interesting)
Epic chaos! Cash is King!
-True Story
Re:Cash payments should always be available (Score:5, Insightful)
If CC companies didn't have such a strong foothold on cashless transactions it wouldn't be so bad.
For example in Tokyo I can buy a new transit pass from any of the dozens of railroads, load money onto it, and use it to buy goods at many stores and vending machines. The convenience of cashless with pseudo-anonymity and no bank account required.
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Once cash is gone then the banks + Apple really will be the ones in charge or your life.
Peak iPhone says otherwise.
Once cash is gone then the banks + Google really will be the ones in charge or your life.
Re:Cash payments should always be available (Score:4, Insightful)
How is cashless legal? (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyone know how operating a cashless business is legal by refusing Legal Tender?
Isn't the entire point to have a common / ubiquitous currency that is available to ALL citizens?
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Anyone know how operating a cashless business is legal by refusing Legal Tender?
It would only be a problem if they let the customer incur the obligation and then refuse the legal tender.
If the merchant makes incurring the obligation contingent on the form of payment, then I suspect the merchant is legally in the clear. It is no different than a sign on the cash register that reads, "no bills over $20."
I wonder how they will write the law. For example, if it is not written in a clear and precise way, I could have a coffee shop with a sign on the door: "cash transactions
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If the merchant makes incurring the obligation contingent on the form of payment, then I suspect the merchant is legally in the clear.
I don’t see how that holds up as any sort of principle. It’s not as if I can discriminate based on some arbitrary trait, and as long as I make it clear to potential customers that I’m in the clear.
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Otherwise all those stores that say a $20 is the highest bill they would accept would be illegal or how some places will not accept money that is too bad of shape.
"All debts, public and private." But if no debt... (Score:5, Insightful)
[Legal tender] only refers to the US Government.
The notice on a Federal Reserve Note explicitly includes private debt: "This note is legal tender for all debts, public and private." Cashless businesses avoid the legal tender rules not by asserting that they are "private" but by structuring their transactions to avoid creating a "debt" in the first place. They do this by requiring payment in full up front before handing over ownership of goods or performing a service.
Re:"All debts, public and private." But if no debt (Score:4, Interesting)
I love Canada's solution to the Wheelbarrow problem.:
Coins have a legal tender limit per person per day.
the 51st penny paid to an entity in a day is not considered legal tender.
(Don't recall the exact limits, but it's about 1 roll of each deonmination of values = $1, $50 for coins valued $2-$5; Single coin for denominations $10+)
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"This note is legal tender for all debts, public and private." (emphasis mine).
Re:How is cashless legal? (Score:4, Interesting)
If the service is performed before it is paid for then a debt is incurred.
Legally, this is not true, [wikipedia.org] if the merchant clearly states the terms of the transaction ahead of time.
Additionally, the obligation to accept cash does NOT extend to an obligation to give change. So if you take a two mile taxi ride, and the driver then tells you he only has $20 in change, he may still have to accept your $100 bill as payment, but you just paid $80 for the ride.
Re:How is cashless legal? (Score:4, Informative)
Anyone know how operating a cashless business is legal by refusing Legal Tender?
Isn't the entire point to have a common / ubiquitous currency that is available to ALL citizens?
Can I use cash to buy from Amazon?
Public or private (Score:4, Informative)
when I look at a dollar bill, it says "this note is legal tender for all debts, public or private".
So I'd think that if you offer to pay your coffee-shop bill with dollar bills, that's legal tender for the debt you owe then for the service. "A creditor is obligated to accept legal tender toward repayment of a debt." [investopedia.com]
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If they haven't sold the coffee to you, then there is no debt, and therefore they don't have to accept your legal tender.
That being said, I think most places should still allow payment by cash, even if I increasingly opt not to use cash.
Order matters [Re:Public or private] (Score:3)
If they haven't sold the coffee to you, then there is no debt, and therefore they don't have to accept your legal tender.
Most restaurants I go to, you get your meal first, and then you pay.
I guess you're right about coffee shops, though-- it's counter service, usually, where you pay then get your coffee.
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Not a lawyer, but I believe the act of ordering is entering into a verbal contract. "I would like a coffee." followed by "Ok, that will be $5.99" is the extent of what would be required to enter into the contract. Same reason it's not legal to go into a restaurant, order a bunch of food, then just leave after the waitstaff enters the order.
It would be interesting to get an actual lawyer's interpretation of how this applies. [hg.org] The whole "both parties must agree to the terms" stuff in there that seems to blo
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https://www.federalreserve.gov... [federalreserve.gov]
No Electricity = No Internet (Score:3)
I live in an urban area served by Southern California Edison (SoCalEd). Without fire, earthquake, or severe weather, SoCalEd fails more than once each year. When there is an interruption in electricity -- whether it is for 5 seconds or 5 hours -- my Internet service through Spectrum dies, sometime for over an hour after a 5 minute interruption of electricity.
Many Internet-connected devices require electricity. New York City also experiences occasional interruptions of electrical service. How does a cashless restaurant get paid when that happens?
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and a cellular modem used as a peer when the main upstream connection goes down.
How much does it cost to run this backup per year?
more at stake (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:more at stake (Score:4, Insightful)
Cash is a no win situation for restaurants... (Score:2, Interesting)
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How about Tourists ? (Score:2, Informative)
Last trip to NY from Canada, I bought only cash with me because of the cut that my credit card get with each transactions in foreign currency.
If most of the restaurants where cashless, I don't know what I would have eaten.
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How about the other way around? (Score:2)
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Dumbass idea, I hope he gets to ban it (Score:2)
Why take away options to pay for your services?
Generally, places will ADD payment options... Not alienate their other customer-base that's been used to the other methods for so long.
How about this... (Score:2)
Ban an establishment from refusing cash, unless there is a business or vending machine within 500ft of
the entrance advertising a service where legal tender can be used to purchase prepaid cards or tokens
which will be accepted by the establishment and at least 20% of nearby businesses, AND when the customer is billed,
the customer's bill at the establishment will be discounted by the sum total of all "load fees" or other charges that could be incurred
from the time of obtaining the card or token until after
Racist...Really (Score:2)
So could people enumerate just what is left in this world that is NOT racist? I am simply amazed that I find the time to be a racist and still get all my work done...whew.
Google pay, paypal, prepaid and debit cards (Score:2, Redundant)
Odd thing which happened at my store last night... (Score:5, Informative)
A customer came in who bought one of those pre-paid credit cards. He wanted to put more money on it. Thing is, we have no way of doing it. He said he doesn't have online access. And he needed money on the card because the hotel he went to required a card. Even though he had cash to pay a deposit. The only thing we could do is sell him another one which cost him a $4.95 surcharge.
Imagine if you were homeless and had to pay $5 every time you needed to get a new card. In my area that's enough to get a container of instant coffee/tea, a loaf of bread, and two cans of vegetables.
I applaud and approve of this Mr. Torres (Score:4)
Long term thinking (Score:5, Insightful)
Besides the usual no power, no network and everything else required for electronic transactions to happen issues. . .
If everyone went cashless tomorrow, what happens when Visa, MC, Apple Pay, etc decide they want more of a cut than they already get by raising the percentage fees per transaction ?
Do we really want so few unregulated companies with that much control over, what will be, the end cost for a consumer ?
Imagine if it were PayPal only and what kind of nightmare that would turn into.
Re: Wall Street! (Score:5, Insightful)
I think what's more funny is that he's trying to be politically correct while implying that black people are poor, rather than just saying it negatively impacts the poor.
PC Principal would have broken broken his legs just for that kind of agregious microagression.
Re: Wall Street! (Score:5, Insightful)
I am not sure if the cashless restaurants are doing this as a code to be exclusionary. There is just a lot of overhead dealing with cash, especially in expensive cities such as New York City, where square footage is expensive and to waste it for a cash lock box/register is expensive.
I actually think a good solution would be blocks having a reverse ATM Where people put Cash into a machine and it will provide them with/update a Prepaid card that they can use the services of these venues without needing a bank account or expensive tools.
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I am not sure if the cashless restaurants are doing this as a code to be exclusionary.
In my experience, entrepreneurs are extremely uncaring about other people's problems, and those cashless establishments are a good example of them concentrating only on their own problems and totally not thinking about others.
Re: Wall Street! (Score:5, Insightful)
When you go to the bathroom are you thinking about others? How about when you make yourself a bowl of soup? Are you thinking of others when you deposit your paycheck? And no, not your family/household, that is just a larger group of self because it is all one closely dependent team.
Is there some particular reason these guys should be "thinking of others" in their moves while they try to eek out a living? It isn't like they are closing the doors of cash businesses. Those others like you and those you are talking about obviously aren't thinking about the small business attempts that will be bankrupt and abject failures because of something like this. No doubt you see some rich guy in a slick suit working from a skyrise in your head, in reality there might be some of those overseeing franchising or something but the people who are hurt are John, Jose, Jamel, Sandy, and Sarah who saved up to get enough money just to turn around and borrow the rest to start that franchise. Now they'll lose their life savings or simply not have this lower startup cost opportunity and never break out of the hamster wheel, the rich guy in a slick suit will just do something else. This is especially damaging for John since he already had to work the hardest and save the most because everyone else on the list gets waived requirements and preference for SBA loans while John who grew up on food stamps is 'privileged' even though he systematically has to outperform everyone else to get the same opportunities.
Re: Wall Street! (Score:4, Insightful)
"Is there some particular reason these guys should be "thinking of others" in their moves while they try to eek out a living?"
Not at all. Even more: that would be highly unexpected.
And that's one of the reasons why we have laws in place: for people to do the necessary when otherwise they wouldn't be inclined to.
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Or to push a political agenda and force people to act in a manner there isn't any sane reason they should. We have laws to keep someone from something underhanded, dishonest, keep a level playing field, etc. The law doesn't exist to force people to sacrifice themselves for others as if they should value those others more highly than themselves!
This entire concept is valuing a group that is pitiable over a group that is actually productive and contributing to society, not because there is any actual need but
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Like many laws, depends on use.
Other examples include that Captain of the Italian cruise ship that ran aground being sent to prison for not making sure the passengers were safe before he left the ship. And even the law about yielding to a pedestrian, even if they're unimportant, or using a handicapped space instead of letting an unimportant cripple use it.
While you're right that ideally laws shouldn't force people to act civilized, unluckily there is a whole class of self-important assholes who will abuse o
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It sounds like neither of you understands what that means. In one sense it refers to the fact that fed notes are considered "legal money" and can legally be used in place of the gold and silver the constitution requires but the courts have interpreted it as not requiring.
The notes are legal tender for debt because US currency is based on debt, all federal reserve notes represent debt and are promissory notes. Essentially, they are IOU's the federal reserve issues at its discretion. Each dollar note represen
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In my experience, entrepreneurs are extremely uncaring about other people's problems
Well, they are and they aren't. They care a great deal about solving the problem they're trying to solve in a way that people will pay money to have the solution. Or to be specific, they're trying to solve the problem of customers being hungry and wanting convenient and tasty food at a good price. As others have mentioned, part of the "good price" bit is not having to deal with cash.
As an entrepreneur, you can't solve every problem for everyone. I'm sure they recognize that some people like to use cash. The
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I am not sure if the cashless restaurants are doing this as a code to be exclusionary.
Yep.
It is more interesting than "exclusionary". Few have followed the shift to
a "rentier" state (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rentier_state).
Often the lease for a property includes a percentage ($$) of the till.
So on one side the landlords (and FBI) are pushing for an easy to audit system.
On another side the political kickbacks, protection rackets no longer have a cash till
to drain in difficult to audit ways.
On the customer side privacy games are very much involved.
Did Uncle Ernie pay cash for the lavish
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But what if you are that panhandler and all you have is cash, and you wasn't to buy something but no one will take your money.
Now granted if you are poor it isn't the best use of your money to buy food from restaurants buy get it for cheaper at a grocery store (and if you are that poor then you should already have SNAP (food stamp)) however if we value freedom, we shouldn't be so judgemental on their spending habits, because they may have a good reason to do so at that time.
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We shouldn't be judgmental of their spending habits but we should dictate to the owners of the establishments without regard for their "reasons?"
There are no shortage of options if you have cash, particularly options which are viable for people with low income.
There are rules about employment discrimination and even those are morally questionable when it comes to privately held and small businesses. Really, some measure of that is probably fair with the liability immunity that comes with incorporating but s
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Just strikes me as a horrible thought process, and show how everyone these days is trying to make ev
Re:Wall Street! (Score:4, Interesting)
I agree that correlation !=causation, and would further that Americans DO need to worry about race and entitlement.
I boycott fast food kiosks; I want humans to be employed, even if they're McJobs.
I boycott the self-scan checkout lines for the same reason. I'm not trying to hang on to concepts of the 1960s, rather, the death of service by a thousand cuts usually means that the labor costs shift into the quarterly earnings report to Wall Street as a "labor savings".
There are people that lead good honest lives in occupations like: janitor, food server, and the jobs that aren't in tech, health care, that don't lead to glorious McMansions and Estates by Lake of the Gravel Pit. But they need jobs. Not installing kiosks.
Truthiness versus evidence (Score:5, Insightful)
I boycott fast food kiosks; I want humans to be employed, even if they're McJobs. I boycott the self-scan checkout lines for the same reason.
The flaw in your argument is that you assume incorrectly that using kiosks equals reduced employment. Your theory is simple and logical but the problem is that it isn't supported by evidence. Unemployment rates are right in line with if not better than historical norms. You're making an argument based on truthiness [wikipedia.org] rather than actual facts. What actually happens is that people find other jobs doing other more value added activities. The industrial revolution replaced a lot of manual labor (the McJobs of the era) with automation but guess what? Unemployment didn't increase - people found other jobs that previously weren't available. People moved off the farm to jobs that previously didn't even exist.
Jobs need to actually add value. Jobs that exist unjustified by economic need are nothing more than charity. Charity is a good thing but it shouldn't be a permanent state of existence. Keeping an economically inefficient job out of some misplaced idea that you are helping people causes real economic harm to society and individuals. It makes companies that do it less competitive and in the long run it doesn't do the people in the make-work job any favors either.
Re:Truthiness versus evidence (Score:4, Insightful)
Um, no.
There is a local chain grocery store. A friend works there. It was the stated goal of putting in self-scan to reduce the "cashier nightmare" they had. The goal was to reduce 90 cashiers to 60. This includes weighting for those absent, out on workman's comp, on various leaves (military, child-related, jury duty, etc etc). The real yield is 74 max available for shift work reduced to 40 available for shifts.
Whose charity are you talking about? There is meaning in being able to put food on your family's table. It isn't charity. Swiping the margin and paying it to a stockholder rather than an employee is a fool's sense of productivity gain. I don't have a robot as a next door neighbor. My family doesn't consist of robots and kiosks. I don't sit next to robots on a train. This competitiveness you cite is undoubtedly a problem, and whole bookshelves are filled with books on how labor and economies are intertwined and meshed. This is about living lives, and not wealth creation for societies. Happiness does not come from assets beyond one's capacity to spend. It comes from dignity and respect and joy.
Re:Truthiness versus evidence (Score:4, Insightful)
so a low skill job goes away and a few different high skilled jobs appear.
Re:Truthiness versus evidence (Score:4, Insightful)
Six people who feed families lose their job for one robot repair person but really wants to be a Ruby programmer. Fie.
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six low level jobs replaced by a number of high paying jobs is better for the majority
Only if the higher paying jobs pay enough to put the money into the economy that the eliminated jobs did. That would include jobs sustained by that new spending. Otherwise, all that happens is the rich get richer, one person's life improves a bit, and 6 become worse off.
The purpose of a company is not employment (Score:3)
There is a local chain grocery store. A friend works there. It was the stated goal of putting in self-scan to reduce the "cashier nightmare" they had. The goal was to reduce 90 cashiers to 60.
So what? EVERY company eliminates costs when it is possible to do so and do otherwise is foolish. Margins in a grocery store are thin to begin with. You seriously think they aren't going to cut costs whenever they can? They don't hire those people because they are feeling magnanimous but because they don't have a better alternative. Hiring someone is an exchange of labor for capital. It's not some touchy-feely crap about "dignity and respect and joy". If you get those things from a job, great, but it
Re: Wall Street! (Score:2, Interesting)
You remind me of how some black people say that going to college is "acting white" and therefore derided.
Re: Wall Street! (Score:5, Interesting)
You remind me of how some black people say that going to college is "acting white" and therefore derided.
I spent my last few High School years in the US at a majority black High School and was surprised to witness this at my school very strongly. A lot of really intelligent black kids would "act dumb" and get bad grades by not doing homework, etc, not because they were lazy, or unintelligent, but because there was a lot of social-pressure on them to act-dumb.
There are probably thousands of would-be highly gifted scientists, inventors, and entrepreneurs doing menial work today because society pushed them in that direction instead of nurturing their gifts.
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Re:Wall Street! (Score:4, Funny)
Anybody who drinks $5 bad coffee _isn't_ poor, just stupid.
That's Charbucks anywhere, it's worse in Manhattan and other high rent zip codes. Do homeless bums really want artisanal, small plot, central American coffee at $10 a cup?
Re:Wall Street! (Score:4, Interesting)
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For this argument, that doesn't make sense to rate it per capita.
For gross numbers, total poor whites have always and still do out total number of poor blacks.
So, if there are more poor whites in total than poor blacks, and we go cashless, it actually will affect more white people than black people.
This conversation and subject doesn't affect why blacks per capita are more poor, this it arguing that public businesses goin
Re:Wall Street! (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Paper cash handling (Score:5, Insightful)
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Which is why you will typically find a person that runs the register while other people handle the food. It's a good answer to your observation.
True; we wouldn't want to get hepatitis all over the money ...
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Which is why you will typically find a person that runs the register while other people handle the food. It's a good answer to your observation.
Have you ever paid attention to the people in a Subway restaurant? Watch them next time. One person is at the register and another person puts food on to handle food... Then they get busy so the person at the register starts helping out with food- puts gloves on as well... then when gets back to register takes money (still wearing gloves)- then goes back to handling food with same gloves on.
Wearing gloves doesn't stop the spread of germs from money to food. If you handle money in gloves you need to thro
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Is a credit card which has been handled by many sets of hands really that much better?
"Germs" are a silly argument against cash, but yes, bacteria will adhere less to a smooth non-porous surface, and will not survive as long with no protection from desiccation.
Besides, some exposure to germs is actually good for people -- helps modulate the immune system and prevent autoimmune illnesses.
Would you eat at a restaurant that advertised their poor hygiene?
The immune systems of very young children benefit from exposure to a wide variety of NON-disease causing bacteria. They don't benefit from exposure to actual diseases, nor is there evidence that the benefits of exposure extends into adulthood or even later childhood.
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Ordering kiosks [ideally that accept cash] solve that. People preparing food never handle the cash - win.
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Somehow I don't think the guy on the side of racial equality is somehow the scary, resentful fascist police state. You might want to re-think that.
You've just proclaimed blind faith in the utterance of politicians. Congrats.
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Bartering is the last-ditch mechanism by which The People can escape economic malfeasance by The Government manipulating its own currency. When the German government began printing copious amounts of money after WWI to pay back war debt, you needed a wheel
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Politician wants you to give up your choices, want to use the police to force his own choices upon you.
Um, how is forcing restaurants to take cash making you "give up your choices"? They aren't forcing you to pay with cash, only forcing them to accept cash.
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Politician wants you to give up your choices, want to use the police to force his own choices upon you.
Politician justifies this by telling stories, trying to make you afraid, or angry, or resentful, or otherwise too emotional to ask yourself how any of this is his business, or the business of the police, or anyone else's business. Why can't the people involved in the transaction simply choose for themselves? (Don't ask. Don't think. Emote! Otherwise politicians won't have power over you.)
Except in this case, we are talking about currency, which is literally government fiat currency. It has no intrinsic value, other than the government recognizing it as currency.
The police are involved in either case - if you don't pay a restaurant, they sic the police on you.
So fine, come to your own agreement, but if you want armed agents of the state to enforce it, then you have to play by the state's rules. And as Churchill said, determining those rules via democracy is the least worst of all the ways
Someone is losing a choice either way (Score:3)
Politician wants you to give up your choices, want to use the police to force his own choices upon you.
This is the "have you stopped beating your wife yet?" argument. Give up choices? Someone has to give something up here. Either A) the customer has to give up choice of payment type or B) the restaurant has to accept a payment type they might not prefer. Why should the rights of the restaurant supersede the customer rights or vice-versa? Someone has to loose this argument. If the politician does nothing then they are de-facto taking the side of the restaurant. If they act then they are taking the side
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Re:Very Slippery Slope (Score:5, Insightful)
What the fuck are you on about?
This is a step in the right direction of not having every fucking transaction go through some 3rd party service. You're saying you're against this?
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There are cards you can get that are reloadable. It does not need to be tied to a bank account. I do not believe using card is exclusionary...
Those cards also aren't free, whereas in many instances credit/debit cards are.
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I do not believe using card is exclusionary...
Except for
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What about Kenny and his family...are they also not included because they're low-income, or are you going to be racist and exclude them because they're white? He wasn't able to enjoy Halloween like the rest of Southpark, because he lacked a cellphone to ride a scooter. F'n stuck up New Yorker, you need some Tegridy.
ManBearPig is real!
They do get to live in SoDoSoPa for really cheap though. Of course, SoDoSoPa did die out when Shi Tpa Town got a Whole Foods....
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