As all of you know by now, I’m a big fan of the digital lifestyle but I have a first-world perspective. I want to be able to use Apple pay because it’s easier and I don’t have to carry around a bunch of cash or credit cards. Those are legitimate reasons given where I live but in some parts of the world, digital payments are the difference between being stuck in debilitating poverty and the chance to better your circumstances. For many people in developing countries, digital payments offer bank-like services to those who would otherwise have to rely on cash and a chance to start small businesses and escape from poverty.
Now Google, the Gates Foundations, and other charities are trying to spread digital payments to developing countries. That’s a good thing, of course, wherever you live but it’s worth asking what implications it has for the world at large.
In the near term, it’s a direct challenge to those resisting cashless business practices by bleating the abhorrent neologism “unbanked.” As the developing countries show, far from holding the disadvantaged down, digital payment methods, properly applied, offer a way up. More generally, movements like these will help to normalize the idea of digital cash.
As I’ve said before, I’m not advocating for a cashless society but I am in favor of having the universal ability to make payments digitally. For me, that’s a selfish desire to be spared the burden of having to carry around a wallet. For many of those in developing countries, it’s a matter of survival.