When Panhandling Meets Digital Currency
August 26 2008 / by John Heylin
Category: Social Issues Year: General Rating: 4
If you work in a major city chances are you see the homeless everyday, deftly ignoring their gaze or side-stepping their outstretched hands. Yet despite our avoidance, we still occasionally give them a dollar from our pockets. But one thing I’ve never heard people discussing is this – With the digitization of money, what will happen to the homeless?
Our society is inexorably moving closer to a world where paper currency is going to be obsolete. Even small items such as coffee get the plastic treatment for the person on the go. When you pay for your coffee, what are the odds you charge it to a card? Chances are you opt for either credit or debit. In effect, we are eliminating spare hard change.
I experienced this phenomenon just a few months ago when coming out of my local butcher shop. Having paid for everything with my credit card, I had no spare change for the man who sets up shop just outside. He asked me for change, I replied that I had none. Because this statement was true I felt great that I was able answer truthfully while still employing evasive maneuvers.
With hard currency becoming increasingly scarce, perhaps what panhandlers need is a card-scanning device, much like MasterCard has right now withPayPass where purchases under $25 just need a wave of the card. We’d have to outfit every panhandler with a card reader that deducts $1 from people who swipe their cards across their device.
Not only would this make it easier to donate money for us on the go, but odds are with such an impersonal card swipe that more people would donate. Money donated to each reader would go to the homeless persons personal bank account (untaxed by the state, or maybe taxed a little to cover the cost of the reader and bank account) where they can cash out at any ATM machine.
The major issues with this would of course be theft and loss. Replacing a reader might be costly, but more than likely the technology is simple enough that the cost would drop over the next few years. If the iPhone could halve in price in less than a year, for than likely card readers could as well.
Hackers taking apart reading devices in order to copy credit card numbers from devices is a real concern. Even tollbooth reading devices like FasTrak are being hacked wirelessly, so how can we expect wireless card readers to be any safer. Somehow the technology would have to be fool-proof so people donating money wouldn’t hesitate to scan their cards.
It’s crazy to think that we’re entering an age where even the homeless need card-readers to get money, but it looks like we’re heading more and more in that direction.
Image: SamPac (Flickr,CC-Attribution)
Comment Thread (2 Responses)
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Your post is very honest and illuminating. I have the same experiences.
I am skeptical that cash will ever become completely obsolete. The article from Wired you link to is informative but doesn’t go into much detail. I am excited about digital transactions being anonymous, if this can happen.
I also am skeptical the state will ever help individual homeless people collect donations. Panhandling is barely condoned now and any investment from the state in this area could be a political quagmire.
Maybe card reader devices could make donating to charitable institutions more common. Maybe volunteers would be the new panhandlers to help the homeless. Similar to The Salvation Army at Christmas, but year-round and more common.
Great post!
Posted by: Mielle Sullivan August 27, 2008
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Or maybe we’d take a more capitalist look at it and start giving the homeless Google jumpers or Nike shoes…
Posted by: martymcfly August 27, 2008
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