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Cashless Australia
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cdev:
Read this- an estimate of property losses after a severe solar storm takes down the North American electrical grid .
Solar Storm Risk to the North American Electric Grid (Lloyds of London)
Nusa:

--- Quote from: bd139 on March 19, 2021, 01:09:33 pm ---Here in the UK the customer is told to piss off or the backup POS unit or mobile network connection is used instead...

--- End quote ---

While some of the 35 countries in America* may be third world, your punch line is apparently not true, given the UK example posted early this this thread:


--- Quote from: themadhippy on March 08, 2021, 09:07:26 pm ---
--- Quote ---What is exactly the nature of the failure that makes all supermarkets not accept cards, but ATMs work
--- End quote ---
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-55805777

--- End quote ---

*I get to interpret your joke, since you used a lazy word. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americas   "The Americas (also collectively called America)"
Simon:
the thing is payment processors are an invisible nuisance. They have nothing to do with the sourcing of the product or the selling of the product. They simply allow it to happen without cash with no added value to the seller or buyer other than making the cashless sale possible. So naturally it's a race to the bottom in an industry that needs rock solid infrastructure and backups which all cost more than the bare minimum required and don't seem to add anything to the service....... until it goes down with no backup.....
bdunham7:

--- Quote from: blueskull on March 19, 2021, 01:35:45 am ---Cash crashes with the stock market, or instability of the issuing government, or a war, or just a large natural disaster.

For that, my friend, you need gold.

--- End quote ---

Cash can get devalued, but it doesn't usually 'crash' overnight, unless the government 'demonetizes' it like India.

If there is a societal collapse so bad that the USD is suddenly not viable tender, then gold won't  be of much use either.  You can't eat it and it won't keep you warm--gold has only been a viable currency where there were actual civilizations.  Post-apocalypse you need goats and ammunition.
Simon:
Money is an artificial construct as is any other token. If i don't need gold in my post apocalyptic life then a single biscuit may be more valuable. The first form of trading was by bartering. When we reached a level of appreciation for gold we came up with convenient measures of it in coinage, the coins were actually worth the metal they were made of, still if the metal was of no use to anyone it would be a worthless token just like our fiat currencies today be they notes and coins or numbers in a computer. You could trade with buttons if everyone agreed to recognise a symbolic value of a button.
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