[kwlug-disc] Cash becoming illegal?

[Khalid Baheyeldin]

On Fri, Nov 5, 2010 at 12:24 PM, John Van Ostrand <john at netdirect.ca> wrote:

>
> > I don't have a driver's licence. I use a passport as my official
> > government ID. I don't have a debit or credit card either, don't
> > particularly want one, and am increasingly unhappy about the
> > transition to "cashless" transactions.
> >
> > In my case I tend to use money orders, but if Glenn is setting a trend
> > of not accepting those either, then I am in trouble.
> >
> > - Paul
>
> I see this problem with a Muslim friend who happens to live in a developing
> country where credit cards are generally not accepted. So there is no
> commercial reason to have one and to some degree there is a religious reason
> not to have one as well.
>

The religious reason is that interest = usury which is forbidden.

But many do have credit cards, provided they pay in full monthly, so that
part is not a big factor.

Locally, cash is king even for large transactions (even land and real estate

in some cases), because the credit card company takes 2% of the transaction.
Something the vendor saves when dealing with cash.

So there is no incentive to use credit cards, other than the internet,
certain
gas stations, ...etc.

Although he can purchase what he needs locally with cash, he cannot take
> part in the Internet society. He has Internet, but how might be purchase a
> domain name, or web service. Aren't they all credit card based?  This
> affects large populations in certain societies.
>

Even if you have credit cards, there are countries that can't buy things
from
the West because of fraud, ...etc. The merchants do not accept credit cards
from these places.

So even if one has a credit card issued from, say, Egypt, there are lots of
things that you can't buy or subscribe to from there.

Paypal also has limited services, or no services, in many countries (e.g.
you can pay but not get paid or vice versa).

So, even though there is internet connection there, DSL and pretty decent
and reasonably priced, ecommerce is way way behind there.
-- 
Khalid M. Baheyeldin
2bits.com, Inc.
http://2bits.com
Drupal optimization, development, customization and consulting.
Simplicity is prerequisite for reliability. --  Edsger W.Dijkstra
Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. --   Leonardo da Vinci
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://kwlug.org/pipermail/kwlug-disc_kwlug.org/attachments/20101105/c4df27c9/attachment.htm>