“You can’t pay cash here”: how our newly cashless society harms the most vulnerable

It had taken so much for Tina, 47, to get to the supermarket; to go home empty-handed left her in tears. At the till, the checkout assistant     1     Tina's items and waved her cash away. "You can't pay cash in here," she told Tina.

Tina is one of the many people who have struggled to purchase     2     during the coronavirus pandemic, as retailers     3    refuse to take cash.

The UK has been moving towards a cashless economy for some time, with ATM usage     4     at about 6% to 10% a year. But Covid-19 supercharged this transition. "During lockdown, cash     5     from ATMs were down about 60%," says Natalie Ceeney of the Access to Cash Review. "That's a huge drop."

But for the approximately 1.2 million people living in the UK who are     6    , buying essentials became a herculean undertaking.

"People without legal immigration status in the UK are not     7     allowed to open a bank account," says James Tullett of the migrant and refugee charity Ramfel. When shops refuse to take cash from these people, they are likely to use     8     services, which are more open to being     9    , Tullett adds.

It is not only unbanked people who will have struggled during the pandemic. Domestic abuse survivors often squirrel away emergency cash. Many abusers     10     bank transactions, leaving survivors reliant on cash.

"Cash is really the bicycle of payments," says Brett Scott, author of 'The Heretic's Guide to Global Finance'. "We need to have a multimodal form of payment systems … cash and card working together, just as bicycle and car lanes go together."

The Art of Gift Giving in China

On my fifth birthday party, after having opened all of my gifts, I expressed my disappointment at the lack of planning and understanding of me that they revealed. Not much has changed since becoming an adult, except that I have learned to keep my mouth shut.

In China, though, my beliefs fit right in. Gifts are a(an)    1    part of friendships and business relationships, and Chinese people share my    2    that a gift should be special, and should have substance (实质).

That doesn’t mean expensive, and in fact it    3    to being “thoughtful”. In America, for example, it wouldn’t be uncommon for a friend to come to a dinner at your home and bring a candle. But in China, if you received a candle, it would have to be very, very special — such as a candle made only in the southern provinces of China from tallow tree (乌桕树) berries, using techniques that have been in place for more than 1,500 years. That’s    4    a gift.

I have received some beautiful gifts from my Chinese colleagues, including tea sets    5    made for me, hand-painted fans, paintings and many books with special significance.

In turn, I must give gifts. I have three standard gifts I use for first meetings: a coffee table book of Arizona photos, an Arizona snow globe and candy made from cactus (仙人掌). Sometimes the gifts I give are    6    things that my colleague    7    from America, such as vitamins and cosmetics (化妆品) not available in China.

As I travel throughout America, I also keep my eyes open for unusual regional gifts, like “tobacco spit” pottery from Kentucky, any “I Love N.Y.” items, United States Congress pens from the Capitol gift shop, California wines or polished semi-precious gems (宝石) from the Southwest. I keep a(an)    8    of gifts in my apartment in Shanghai that I am always restocking as I go back and forth from the United States.

Thanks to my    9    gift exchanges, I have received some amazing things that I truly cherish. And I am glad to finally have found friends who have much in    10    and enjoy giving and receiving meaningful gifts.