Does your choice depends on somehing? And from what country are you?
Norway.
The only ones using cash here are the elderly, immigrant workers and contractors that skip VAT. Been like that a long time. A restaurant chain here stopped accepting cash (illegal), and there was barely some buzz in the media. Buzz so brief I don’t know how it ended.
I almost never have cash on me. It’s debit or credit always. Here’s my thought process on paying with cash. If I buy something that costs, say $4.55, and I hand over a $5 dollar bill, that item has really just cost me $5.00 because what am I realistically going to do with the 45 cents in change?
I put my change in a jar when I empty my pockets. About once a year I’ll take it by the bank and treat myself with the couple hundred dollars it cashes out to.
Are you just throwing yours away?
I’ve got a jar too, but it definitely doesn’t fill up at anywhere near the rate yours does. My pay is direct deposited and every place I shop will take a card. I could either go to the ATM to get cash, use it to pay for things when I don’t have to, collect these small amounts of change, and take it all back to the bank eventually, or I could just not bother with any of these things.
I’ve had like ~70 cents sitting on the shelf for over a year… like, what an I going to do with it? It’s just a pointless pile of coins. half the time those coins are in the wrong combination to pay for whatever other change in my next cash transaction, so I just end up with more coins… which I have to remember to grab when I’m specifically going to a cash-only place…
All of the sub-$1 coins that I have ever received as change in my lifetime would not add up to $100. But I also don’t use (or even carry) cash unless I absolutely must.
Edit to add: I have a jar too. It’s a standard mason jar. I started filling this one after my last move. In 2013.
I have yet to fill it completely.
Back in the day you take that .45 cents and throw it in a big old empty pickle jar with the rest of your loose change.
the problem now is that I’ll just have a big pickle jar with 45 cents. Next year, I’ll have a pickle jar with 60 cents… maybe by the time I retire I’ll have a whole five dollars of change and exchange it for a bill…
Sure. At the current rate. But it’s likely that if you use cash more often then your pickle jar fills up sooner.
The amount of cash I use is only decreasing with every year. I’m not going to further inconvenience myself just to validate a pickle jar.
Credit card for the rewards, paid monthly. Keep cash for tipping and small stuff.
US: Credit card only, almost exclusively using Apple Pay. If I somehow obtain cash, I deposit it so that I can spend it using a card instead and earn the rewards. I actively use about half a dozen cards, choosing the right one for each transaction to maximize rewards.
While its solid you’re into the efficiency of it all, as an outsider it seems like an added headache to remember which card would be best for which outlet / type of transaction. I personally just maintain a few cards and only switch once I’ve reached about 50-60% the limit.
I can’t even remember the last time I had cash in my wallet
Cash, because I try to keep at least some privacy.
Cash. feels better + Banks cant track me
Banks also seem willing to share their data with government agencies.
Interesting to see how common it still is to exclusively use cash, especially in European countries. In Canada, they put us in a prisoners dilemma situation where things cost the same regardless of whether you pay cash or card, but if you pay card, the merchant pays a fee and you get a portion of that fee, making it cheaper for you, while also raising the prices because they need to factor in this extra fee, so things are actually more expensive overall, and moreso if you pay cash.
Besides the monetary incentives, it’s also much easier to track my expenses with a credit card.
USA - Cash a lot more recently. With how easy it is for my bank and stores to track my purchases with card, I’ve switched to cash as much as possible. Some stores say no cash but even those have never actually refused cash. I assume they’re just trying to deter thieves.
The spark for this change for me was Target. I first looked into it cause I hated how they scanned my ID barcode when buying alcohol. Also, they openly track purchases even made without your account by your credit card number. In addition to what I’ve heard about intensive surveillance in the stores via high resolution cameras, enough to read phone messages, I have sworn off Target entirely.
EDIT: oh and to avoid tip creeping. I absolutely hate when non-tipped places ask for tips. Cash makes it a lot easier to avoid.
Half cash, half card. I’m from Germany and I think that giving banks the level of control they’d have in a cashless society is one of the dumbest things a society can do.
I always pay with credit card whenever I can for the rewards, then pay it off fully.
Almost exclusively cash for groceries and outings. Most other things are ordered online anyway. You’d think that working in IT I’d be more progressive but I’m confronted with so much malfunctioning tech that I’d rather have a simple form of transaction I can rely on and keep track of easily. My bank probably has some sort of ancient database that nobody understands anymore since Larry who was maintaining it died of a heart attack two weeks before retirement and now nobody dares to touch it until it’ll eventually fail and cause my card to lose functionality for 3 days. I’ll stick with my coins.
Germany: Credit card most of the time, using Apple Pay.
Some places only take girocard (formally EC), a special system in Germany that is cheaper for the vendor and more common, though some modern banks like N26 don’t give out girocards anymore which is why I have another bank account just for this. Super annoying.
Sometimes cash is still the only option, which is why I always carry 20-30 Euros with me just in case. Examples would be the local farm shop where I buy eggs and veggies, some small restaurants and pubs.
Do people still carry cash these days? Maybe if I was going to a garage sale or some private transaction… but even for those it’s more convenient to do an e-transfer. Some businesses don’t even have cash registers any more, just a card reader.
I sometimes carry cash. I’ll say one thing, paying with cash makes it easier to avoid the tipping creep problem we’re seeing at U.S. businesses that have traditionally not had tipping.
Card. Gotta get that cash back.
