Cash Is Evil

A lot many of my colleagues are presenting the argument that Cash is Evil. Cash is Dead. Cash is a Menace to Society.

I beg to disagree. Whilst I do agree the obsolescence factor has come into play, one can hardly call it game over.

Cash is not evil.

It has been made evil, because of various governments and regulatory bodies who want more control. This is not a contrarian view, but for over 3,000 years, cash or its relative forms have been used. In fact if you read the World Bank reports circa 1995-1998, cash was presented as just another monetary instrument. Not evil.  Today, we need an escape goat for most of the problems (distribution, de-tethered wealth, management, cost of printing and seigniorage incomes to name some).

Let’s talk about money transfers.

From my numbers and feel free to disagree, 84% of remittances are in cash. Because distribution is a weak point for all de novo money transfer operators, the only leveraged advantage you have to kill the physical/geographical point of presence is to argue that “cash is evil” which then gives companies the advantage on onboard customers digitally. As you cannot be everywhere physically, lets us tilt the game in favor of the digital.

Not too long ago, our fathers, mothers, brothers and sisters were paid in cash. Rewards for religious festivities were given in cash, same for wedding gifts, and newborns. It was what we had “rightfully” earned.

It wasn’t evil then. It was honorable. So what changed it? You drinking the regulatory/government kool-aid did.

Cash is neither evil, nor dead. It is being suffocated and killed deliberately. Let us at least be honest about it.

Remember, 84% of the people still use cash for sending remittances (just one example). Cash is just inconvenient for your business model.

This page was last updated on September 1, 2022.