‘Cash is fundamental to human life, like bread, fire, shoes or song’
telegraph.co.ukThe Telegraph’s own Guy Kelly and Christopher Howse, both deft wordsmiths and of very different generations, are here to conduct a weekly study of modern life.
What they like, hate, fight over and agree on may surprise you. This week, they consider the merits of a cashless society.- Christopher HowseA piece of fossil-ised behaviour in Venice is to join a handful of people waiting for the traghetto to ferry them across the Grand Canal.
The convention for the short journey in the large gondola is to stand up, which takes some doing. The fare of 50c is left on the gunwale.If you have more travel time and £1.40 to spare, a similar arrangement applies at King’s Lynn, where the expanse of the Ouse is so great to seaward that it looks from the low-set boat as though it is uphill.Either of these performances is good practice for paying Charon the ferryman’s fare, which he takes from your mouth, to row you on your last journey over the Styx.
PayPal is not accepted.I am trying to say that resisting the so-called cashless society is not just a wise move to stop the state taxing your assets as they lie virtually in the bank. (Before you know it, the authorities will take the chance to apply the sort of social credit points that allow some Chinese people to catch high-speed trains and not others.) I am saying that cash – coins – is more fundamental than accountancy to human life, like bread, fire, door-locks, horses, shoes or song.I don’t mind credit.
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