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A new study out of Sweden says the tiny country is on course to become the world's first "cashless society," thanks in part to a mobile payment app called Swish.
The Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm released a statement in October quoting researcher Niklas Arvidsson, who said cash is an important means of payment in many countries, "... but that no longer applies here in Sweden."
Arvidsson and his team of researchers said there are about 80 billion Swedish crowns in regular circulation, down from 106 billion six years ago. "And out of that amount, only somewhere between 40 and 60 percent is actually in regular circulation. ... Our use of cash is small, and it is decreasing rapidly."
Swish has more than 3.5 million users (of Sweden's total population of 9.5 million) and nearly 4.5 billion Swedish crowns were "Swished" in October.
(Score: 3, Informative) by VLM on Tuesday November 10 2015, @12:31PM
how does one pay a criminal
The old days of barter... also alternative currency such as dollar bills, collectible gold coins, jewelry, bitcoins, bottles of laundry detergent, gasoline cans, food, ammo ...
mean they will no longer have a criminal class
They're importing one as fast as they can, so they'll obviously have plenty of crime ... lots of crime doesn't involve currency.
It'll be interesting to see how long it takes for currency to come back once inevitable bank fees explode plus the tax issue. Imagine having to file income tax paperwork to explain why I transferred $20 to a neighbor for an old broken lawnmower while paying the bank the usual $5 per transaction fee plus he's gotta pay income tax on the $20...
To some extent the story of the modern economy is abandoning the 99% so the 1% can have all the wealth, what do we need currency for if we have nothing, etc. That's probably the long term future goal, almost the entire country on EBT cards with a handful of billionaires.