Inequality, Surveillance and the Cashless Society

Photo by Raymond Kotewicz

Like all new frontiers touted as necessary and worthwhile, the cashless society is advertised as a supremely convenient way to facilitate financial transactions while avoiding such silly inconveniences as carrying cash and scouting for a money dispenser.  A cashless society also facilitates inequality, manifests a pattern of conduct easily monitored by both private companies and State agencies, and repudiates the notion of valid tender.  It also subordinates its users to a digital ecosystem that can...