The problems of paper money pale in comparison with those of a cashless economy.
Credit cards could not be used at convenience stores and other merchants across Japan for hours on Thursday following a system outage that also affected some transportation companies’ credit card-linked electronic money apps. Major credit card issuer Mitsubishi UFJ Nicos Co. said the trouble began around 8 a.m. when card payments could not be processed at some merchants, while Sumitomo Mitsui Card Co. reported a similar problem.
The card companies said the trouble was caused by an outage in an international credit card brand’s network connecting merchants with card issuers. Sources familiar with the matter said the outage occurred within Visa’s network.
Every nation should go to the maximum extremes, including adopting constitutional measures, to ensure that the banks are never allowed to force the people into using digital payment methods. Just their dependence upon electricity is sufficient to demonstrate the absolute need to avoid a digital payments monopoly.