Sweden is a 97% cashless society, the highest in the world. Many businesses and even banks are completely devoid of cash. While it may seem convenient to go cashless, handling cash means retaining your privacy and independence.
The way Friedrich Schneider puts it, “If people use more cards, they are less involved in shadow economy activities.” I take it that any private transactions that don't get to be monitored by the government are shadow economics.
The way Friedrich Schneider puts it, “If people use more cards, they are less involved in shadow economy activities.” I take it that any private transactions that don't get to be monitored by the government are shadow economics.
High-tech Sweden edges closer to becoming cashless society
Financial corporations have an interest in phasing out cash because they will receive a mandatory user fee (aka tax) on all of society's transactions. Sweden was the first European country to introduce bank notes in 1661. Now it’s come farther than most on the path toward getting rid of them.
In most Swedish cities, public buses don’t accept cash; tickets are prepaid or purchased with a cell phone text message. A small but growing number of businesses only take cards, and some bank offices — which make money on electronic transactions — have stopped handling cash altogether.
“There are towns where it isn’t at all possible anymore to enter a bank and use cash,” complains Curt Persson, chairman of Sweden’s National Pensioners’ Organization.
Bills and coins represent only 3 percent of Sweden’s economy, compared to an average of 9 percent in the eurozone and 7 percent in the U.S., according to the Bank for International Settlements, an umbrella organization for the world’s central banks.
But there are pockets of resistance. Hanna Celik, whose family owns a newspaper kiosk in a Stockholm shopping mall, says the digital economy is all about banks seeking bigger earnings.Celik says he gets charged about 5 Swedish kronor ($0.80) for every credit card transaction, and a law passed by the Swedish Parliament prevents him from passing on that charge to consumers. “That stinks,” he says. “For them (the banks), this is a very good way to earn a lot of money, that’s what it’s all about. They make huge profits.”