Lots of places here are still cash only, though fewer than before covid.
There are a few food places that won't take credit cards or only accept them if it's over $10. Cards are very convenient, but I genuinely enjoy paying with cash sometimes. Like I used to go to Haymarket in Boston. (They sell leftover produce from the terminal cheap). And it's all cash. I'm sure their accounting isn't top notch, and they're underpaying their taxes, but it's part of the atmosphere. At the end of the day, they lower their prices. That doesn't work with credit cards and proper cash registers.
Is it even technically legal to refuse cash? It says right on the paper that it's legal for all debts!
I don't like the feeling that every transaction I make is being tracked by an asshole at Chase.
We went to Haymarket a lot when I was in grad school. I started going again because I bike right past it every Friday morning, but for most things it's not much cheaper than Costco and obviously lower quality. There are a few things that are worth it, typically longer lived stuff like squash. Terrible for berries. Ok for apples/oranges/other tree fruits.
Earlier this year I did get an amazing deal on a pack of smoked salmon that was expiring in a couple days, $10 for 3 lb. I think that vendor got busted for selling things outside he wasn't supposed to because that stand disappeared- it was like an outdoor convenience store, selling cheeses and meats and even non-food items for cash which was kind of suspicious.
The vendors always comment on my ebike or ask how fast it goes. One always says, "Nice horse!"
3: Sure. Now that you don't have to bake cakes for gay people, this seems like a low bar to clear.
It seems like selling something children like would be easier if you took cash.
If the gay people could pay for the cake with cash instead of the rainbow themed credit card that all gay people are required to carry the baker would never even know.
I feel pressure to tell my phone my credit card number so I can pay by phone, but I don't get the advantage of that and someone just stole my credit card number this summer. They bought alcohol and had it delivered. Lazy assholes. Walk to the store.
Maybe the fraud was better without in-person contact?
Is it legal for a business in the United States to refuse cash as a form of payment?
There is no federal statute mandating that a private business, a person, or an organization must accept currency or coins as payment for goods or services. Private businesses are free to develop their own policies on whether to accept cash unless there is a state law that says otherwise.
Section 31 U.S.C. 5103, entitled "Legal tender," states: "United States coins and currency [including Federal Reserve notes and circulating notes of Federal Reserve Banks and national banks] are legal tender for all debts, public charges, taxes, and dues." This statute means that all U.S. money as identified above is a valid and legal offer of payment for debts when tendered to a creditor.
https://www.federalreserve.gov/faqs/currency_12772.htm
If it ever went to SCOTUS there would probably be three votes for mandating use of gold coins.
11 is interesting. Seems like they rewrote that to very narrowly interpret "debts." But it makes sense, even if I have to correct my old view of what the wording on the bill means.
If the world goes cashless it bugs me that there is whatever, a 3% sales tax, payable to the credit card companies, on every transaction. I am starting to see ads on social media pre-emptively fighting any regulation of credit card transaction fees with astroturf "organizations" saying "they're going to try to take away your credit card points and rewards! Tell them you don't want that!" It's not the most pressing issue in the world but it bugs me.
Yes, it's problematic (sometimes, you know, deliberately so, IYKWIM), and there's been some backlash.
As far as kids are concerned, sending money to their Apple Watch is about a million times better than having them try to keep and manage paper money.
Elitism works for you, but not everyone has an $400 watch.
We did buy our son an Apple watch, but he's never worn it. But if I give him money and tell him he's got to get his own lunch, he will go to a reputable sandwich shop and get a steak sandwich.
It's discouraging that getting more people to have banks is harder than banning cash-only stores.
Er, card-only is what I meant.
Lots of parking nowadays is app-only.
Yes. I hate that. If there's one thing I hate doing, it's installing an app to do one thing once.
You can get around it by using a web-based portal, which also sucks.
17: Banks really suck if you're poor. Still probably cheaper than the fees for paying bills other ways, but I think postal banking is needed to get more people using banks.
oh god, 20 is the most on target comment in the thread. Exactly that.
Some new food carryout places near me are card-only-- not cheap but not crazy expensive, like the trendy new cookie chain or food hall vendors. A more common problem is an unstocked cash drawer-- you can pay cash if you don't need or want change back. If possible, I pay cash unless I can see the card swipe being done, I've had my credit card number stolen after having a waiter take it to the back to swipe.
So barricaded. So marginalized.
Farther from the consumer level, there's this:
https://www.federalreserve.gov/paymentsystems/fednow_faq.htm
Has anyone here traveled recently to China? The payment system there is tied to identity apparently, makes it difficult for visitors to pay for small things (sometimes including public toilet fee).
I'm still upset I lost a $20 bill in the Yonkers Toys R Us when I was 8. That's the equivalent of about $50 now.
I love cash, the physical utilitarian objects. I got a $5 from 1951 in change a couple of months back. Contemporary chop marks on banknotes are interesting also: https://www.coinbooks.org/esylum_v17n07a21.html
Kids One and Two went to Norway this summer and said they never even saw Norwegian currency. They're enlightened but too-cold-to-be-topless up there, so I presume there is provision for poorer people to have non-cash options, and I presume that also has meant making the vendors eat the transaction costs. Down here in often-topless but not entirely enlightened Germany, everyone is so price-sensitive that those costs are a major sticking point. I've got a stupid-foreigner bank account that sticks 30¢ (or maybe 60¢) on every card transaction, so goddamn if I'm going to add 30% to a €1 candy bar. Weight loss!
Anyway. I can think of a row of semi-fast food joints near Alexanderplatz where some are card-only, some are cash-only, and some actually go both ways.
24: I suspect that's how I got my credit card number stolen too.
Seems like they rewrote that to very narrowly interpret "debts."
My mental model of it is, if they have a sign up that notifies the buyer, then ordering something at the counter doesn't count as incurring a debt because it violates the posted policy. Like not taking bills greater than $20.
It varies wildly from country to country in Europe. Germans still love cash.
29: My impression is that Germany is uniquely cash-loving in Western Europe. There was an FT article about Dutch gangs targeting German ATMs since there's so much more paper cash floating around there (and native organized crime hasn't put enough pressure on banks to upgrade their countermeasures yet).
The UK isn't cashless but contactless is vastly preferred. We do have postal banking. Cash is mostly for paying small businesspeople who prefer to do stuff under the table. I will occasionally see someone down on their luck counting out individual coins at the corner shop, but even that isn't very common.
Japan used to be cash-heavy, with most small business not taking credit, but the pandemic seems to have finally pushed them over the line. (In keeping with their good engineering + stodgy bureaucracies, they don't yet have the tap-credit-card-to-pay-for-transit systems of London / NYC, but they will soon.)
(Going there in two days! Woot.)
I admit I don't use the tap thing. I don't know if my card will do that. The bus has its own card.
I don't understand how tipping works in UK now that everything has switched over to contactless. Many payment interactions don't have a chance for you to enter a tip yourself, but then you can't leave a cash tip. I feel like maybe you're supposed to talk to the person about the tip so they can enter it? The whole thing is so awkward. Or have ya'll figured this out in the last year-and-a-half since I was last there?
London is increasingly cashless. Less so at permanent establishments until recently, but almost all the little food stalls and increasingly proper stores/restaurants too, and pretty much all the self service tills at supermarkets. Of course, interchange fees are much lower here than in the US, so it's more attractive for merchants, and the contactless fees are even lower so it's viable for even sub-£1 purchases. Apparently cash accounted for only 14% of all payments in the UK (by number) in 2022, though presumably that doesn't include crime/black market stuff.
I don't think I've even had cash in my wallet for the last three months.
I believe in Berkeley all businesses must accept cash (2019 ordinance).
36: If your card has a symbol on the front or back that looks like the Wi-Fi symbol, but on its side (arcs increasing from left to right).
And of course rising up alongside contactless card we also have smartphone payment. I have finally broken in this regard, finding that as long as I'm using Google Pay rather than a bespoke app (like some transit systems fruitlessly try to promote), it's as few as three phone swipes, comparable in effort to getting out my wallet.
I think 11 and 31 are making the issue unnecessarily complicated, or maybe the Fed's FAQ itself is the problem. Wikipedia seems clearer on the subject. The very first line:
Legal tender is a form of money that courts of law are required to recognize as satisfactory payment for any monetary debt.
Followed by a ton of arcana about the economic policy and country-by-country breakdowns, and then, near the end of the section about the United States:
Contrary to common misconception, there is no federal law stating that a private business, a person, or a government organization must accept currency or coins for payment. Private businesses are free to create their own policies on whether they accept cash, unless there is a specific state law which says otherwise.
So everyone is allowed to accept cash to settle debts. However, only courts are required to accept it for that purpose, and I'll bet even they could penalize you somehow if you tried to pay a $200 fine in pennies.
Personally, cashlessness seems more common in newer establishments to me but I can't think of any hard-and-fast rules about it, and restrictions on using cards still seems more common than an unwillingness to accept cash, but both of those are just vague impressions.
I almost never carry cash. The only place I pay cash these days is the barber, who doesn't take cards. My son (10) has his own contactless card although he doesn't always remember to carry it when we are out and about, so he can pay for his own snacks and things.
We did have to pay cash at a few places when I was in Czechia this summer, but I got by with a much smaller sum than I ordinarily would when going to a foreign country for three weeks. Luckily a meal out and drinks for three just about comes in around 1000 crowns in most places, so you don't end up having to carry a load of change and smaller notes.
I don't think 43 is correct. In Julllard v Greenman, 1884, a private plaintiff was seeking payment of a $5,100 debt for his cotton and the Supreme Court said he was legally obligated to accept Civil War greenbacks. For whatever reason it doesn't apply to retail transactions, maybe they don't constitute "debt" at all or something, but it does apply even to unwilling private creditors in at least some situations. Or did.
It follows that the act of May 31st, 1878, ch. 146, is constitutional and valid; and that the Circuit Court rightly held that the tender in treasury notes, reissued and kept in circulation under that act, was a tender of lawful money in payment of the defendant's debt to the plaintiff.
45: yeah, I've always understood it to be simply that wanting to purchase something doesn't create a debt. Once you've extended credit to somebody, you might have to accept legal tender (my guess is it's a little more complicated than that, don't actually know anything about this); but you surely don't have any general obligation to become a creditor in the first place if you don't want to obligate yourself to accept cash to repay the debt.
14: There are a number of (blue, of course) states and cities with laws prohibiting card-only retail, but I don't imagine they're well-enforced. The DC bill referenced at the link became law a couple years ago, but has routinely been ignored. And I see now that it's only as of this month that the city has even purported to enforce it! Though not with fines apparently--just a stern lecture I guess?
May one pay for those stern lectures with cash?
Back in the day the US mint used to let you buy coins with a credit card with no fee, so you could rack up huge amounts of credit card points and signup bonuses if you found a way to spend huge amounts of coins. Lots of places won't take payment in huge amounts of coins, but apparently you can play property taxes that way. (Maybe all taxes? But you'd probably have to take the coins somewhere very inconvenient for federal taxes.)
I wonder if you're allowed to pay fines in coins too?
48: "Back in the day" for what, a couple years from the start of the discount program until it got reported on and the Mint changed its terms?
5: Pre Trader Joe's we used to get great cheese cheap. It was already ripe of course, but that isn't always a problem. Not everyone can use Costco quantities.
17: I wish we had postal banking. Someone told me Walmart did banking in Mexico. Much as I hate Walmart, I think that's a not bad thing.
49: Started around '05. Mint put a limit on purchases in '08, that turned out not to be enough and they more thoroughly shut it down in '11. This is also back when you could get lifetime AA "million mile" benefits by spending enough on their credit cards (also closed in '11). The golden age of manufactured spending.
It used to bug me as a kid that the abovevground green line trains would not take dollar bills - only coins or monthly passes. I suppose you could have done a token with change, but tokens were worth the cost of a fare at one of the underground stations.
It used to bug me as a kid that the abovevground green line trains would not take dollar bills - only coins or monthly passes. I suppose you could have done a token with change, but tokens were worth the cost of a fare at one of the underground stations.
33-34: Yes, Germany is definitely at one end of the European curve in terms of using cash. Also, as I understand it, on sensitivity to price in groceries and similar basic consumer goods.
I seem to have adopted local customs to the extent that, for example, I have not accepted a 50% increase in the price of saltines, and they have fallen off my usual buying list.
Not really.. It's an age thing too. My mom has plenty of money but she likes cash cause she knows what she spends,
Only old people eat saltines if they aren't sick.
I charged a man in Reno just to watch him pay
Since my wife runs a retail store, she prefers cash and we preferentially use it at small restaurants and stores, but Covid and touchless transactions really drove up people's use of cards for even trivial transactions. (Like Doug mentioned, people wanting to buy a soda and chips for $2.50 and charge it -- lots of small transactions drive up per transaction fees with card processors.)
It is annoying to lose that 2%+ per transaction, but the bigger concern is when they determine that a transaction was fraudulent and reverse the charges, making you eat the cost sometime later.
More common. Also it turns out I love using my phone to pay for things.
I don't want the kids to have phones yet, but the Calabat is begging for a Garmin Bounce bc his best friend has one.
Is that like the InReach? You can get the SOS button after you've been attacked by a bear.
When I traveled to a major city in China a few years ago, it was very difficult to find a place that accepted cash and most places wouldn't accept any of my cards (despite my having done the stuff I was supposed to do and being assured ahead of time that they'd work in China). I ended up stuck in this weird limbo where I could only go get food with a student volunteer who would pay for me and whom I would then reimburse with cash once I could find an ATM that accepted my card. Unexpectedly stressful.
Only Nixon could pay cash in China.
60: more like the kids'version of the Forerunner. Do you have an Inreach? I feel like I ought to get one.
I have the old kind. You can push a button and it remember where your car is.
Its weird how the weed store needs to pretend its an ATM and gives you a few dollars back when you make a purchase with a debit card. Whats that about?
65: Probably something federal? I haven't seen that in particular, not that I've been to many stores, but I have seen a place that had an ATM extremely close to the counter.
65, 66: Yeah, I'd guess something federal too. So the states have legalized it because most criminal law is state law (nb: ianal) but the feds have not and they matter because interstate commerce and FDA.
To make matters worse, federal marijuana law is also (iirc) tied up in international conventions regarding prohibition of various drugs, so getting it untangled even if both parties wanted to is not completely simple.
I don't think the treaties are that important for North American policymaking. Canada has done full recreational legalization at the national level which by right would completely flout the treaty. The US not holding states to the treaty (or at least not taking over for their lack of enforcement) is only a slightly lesser version of the same. If the US went Canada's way, it would cement the emerging consensus that the treaty is a dead letter and is going to be redone to remove marijuana or completely rewrite provisions on it.
(Further evidence for that consensus being perceived by less internationally powerful countries: late last year Thailand did medical legalization; but apparently didn't bother to enforce it at all since there are now shops everywhere.)
My mental model of it is, if they have a sign up that notifies the buyer, then ordering something at the counter doesn't count as incurring a debt because it violates the posted policy. Like not taking bills greater than $20.
This is absolutely right. The question is not "can I pay for stuff with this", the question is "can I be sued for non-payment of debt if I offered to repay a debt with this". And the law says that for credit cards, gold bars, rare stamps, frequent flier miles etc the answer is "yes" but for currency notes it is "no".
If you're selling something, you can set whatever restrictions on payment you like. Cash only, Amex only, no cash, euros only, notes only, dollar bills only, no coins, whatever you like. If the customer doesn't want to pay that way, then they don't have to engage in a transaction with you.
68: I think if you have a marijuana conviction you are still banned from entering the US. Canada won't let you in if you have a DUI.
I have previously told the story of when I drove up the coast from DC to western Mass, paying all the tolls with rolls of pennies. The toll collectors hated it, but hated having me hold up the line arguing with them even more.
I was protesting sales taxes.
I got rid of all the pennies I'd amassed from 3 years of living in a place with sales tax, after having long lived in a place without sales tax, so it worked on that level. We don't have a sales tax here, but we also don't have tolls.
I had an EZpass in NY, closed it and sent back the transponder, and opened one in MA since they charge lower tolls when you use an in state transponder. However sometimes the transponder doesn't read and they instead bill it to the NY account based on the license plate (plate is also registered to MA account but they're choose to charge NY.)
The only way I can see to get out of this is to sell the car or change the license plate. I don't see any way to tell NY EZpass to fuck off because I already returned the transponder and I don't see an option to try closing the account again without returning another transponder (which I don't have).
Maybe you're driving through the toll gate too fast.
We have an 8% sales tax.
Here is a thing that is making me lose my fucking mind: in November, Texas will vote on a constitutional amendment to increase the homestead exemption on local property taxes, and it will be paid for by the surplus from sales tax. (To whatever extent it is paid for, which is not at all clear.) So they quite literally are redistributing money from poor people to rich people.