Prevent diseases? As if. Were such a thing possible surely people would be getting nobel prizes for it.

I do agree it’s “not normal,” especially in the West. It does seem to be significantly more common across Asia.

And I suspect it’ll become more common across the West.

And I hate it. Cash is still king for me for whatever reason.

And just in case you think I’m BS’ing here is an actual government policy explicitly stating that stores can refuse cash payments

https://www.mas.gov.sg/contact-us/faqs/currency-faqs

My friend I’ve been to countries where businesses don’t accept cash and the currency is still considered legal tender.

Like, I’ve (literally) turned up at coffee shops, tried to pay in cash, only to be told “we don’t accept cash, only credit card or digital payment.” (the latter in my experience is often via QR codes and the system sucks because 10 second transactions become 25 second transactions)

The legal frameworks in such jurisdictions may be very different than Denmark’s.

Edit: Beyond which, does Amazon accept cash? eBay? I’ve never heard of them doing so and don’t recall ever seeing the option.

Can the USA even do that? They’re global companies. As whacky as the United States is right now even attempting to do so would be immensely irrational even by Trump’s standards.

I’d guess that Mastercard and Visa would shift their headquarters to somewhere like Switzerland or Singapore pretty quickly after that.

I imagine OP isn’t saying that there literally is no such thing as cash in Denmark but something more nuanced like “cash is becoming rare.”

No idea about Denmark’s laws but there are companies (edit: I mean “countries” not companies) where cash is yes still the legal tender but payment at some businesses can only be made cashless. Denmark may have a law stating businesses must accept cash, but you can certainly have systems where cash is legal tender but some businesses will not accept it.

Damn. I know mailing actual letters has been going the way of the dinosaur and this outcome is in some ways predictable, but it’s still a big shift.

A robust Europe that could be more assertive on the world stage is good for the world in the long run. I say that as an American. Best of luck to the Germans, EU as a whole, the UK, and everyone else in the region.