I understand how people have been predicting it - and that’s actually because there are some good reasons for doing so, and it’s been gradually moving that way. That movement is continuing - and someone saying that we’re not at that finish line yet — doesn’t mean that we’re not getting there. We’re definitely not running back to the “start line” on this one ... :-) ...
SO ... what you’re talking about is for “now” (and I can see that for now) - but we won’t be remaining in this “now” forever. We will be getting to that future, no matter if people like it or not.
When I said there are good reason for going cashless, I can see it. However, at the same time, it leads - potentially - to a greater degree of control over people. And I do believe that’s the way it’s going to go.
Decentralization will make tracing anyone impossible. Your transactions will be distributed as well as merchants receiving payments. These platforms are all being funded and realized as we type. I don’t buy into the gloom and doom what so ever.
The Controllers will be kicking and screaming and threatening but there is not a damn thing they can do about it now but huff and puff.
The time between now and the 2040 of this article is much shorter than between now and the first time I heard we were going to become a cashless society. There are really only “good” reasons for going cashless if you’re the government, cash is expensive to produce, can be counterfeited, and is largely untraceable. For everybody that isn’t the government though it has a few big wins: fast, easy, and largely untraceable. Or on the consumerist side the reasons we use cash are: illegal things, small things, vending machines, bars, and yard sales. Nothing works better for those types of transactions than cash, and most of us participate in at least two of them on a fairly regular basis.
Now it’s possible the government will decide to stop giving in to our demands. But as long as they decide to be at least a little user friendly cash is staying until somebody comes up with something at least as fast, at least as easy AND at least as untraceable. Those chits I mentioned earlier would be about the only thing I can see doing it, but much like the RFID credit card in the RFID grocery store Visa commercial the logistical challenges for something like those chits are epic. You’d need them to be able to talk to all the banks, through all the ATMs, and all the computers, and all the smartphones, and all the cash registers, and they need to talk to all of each other (without having to talk to banks), and people will want to be able to add some security, but they’re also going to want to be able to ignore the security. All of it is technically solvable, even just with the tech we have now, but the solutions aren’t practical and simple enough for it to happen now.
So I stay quite confident in my idea that as long as the government remains a little user friendly there will be cash when you and I die. And even if the government stops private citizens will find a way to keep cash alive at least in the black market. It solves too many problems too much better than the alternatives.