The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
Counterfeiters, Preachers, Techies, Dreamers–and the Coming Cashless Society
Title: The End of Money
Author: David Wolman
Publisher: Da Capo
For ages, money has meant little metal disks and rectangular slips of paper. Yet the usefulness of physical money — to say nothing of its value — is coming under fire as never before. The age of paper dollars and metal coins is coming to a close. Intrigued by the distinct possibility that cash will soon disappear, author and Wired contributing editor David Wolman sets out to investigate the future of money…and how it will affect your wallet.
Wolman begins his journey by deciding to shun cash for an entire year — a surprisingly successful experiment (with a couple of notable exceptions). He then ventures forth to find people and technologies that illuminate the road ahead. He introduces trends powering this shakeup, taking us to hotspots of the cashless revolution. He zooms from the cash-strapped slums of Delhi, to the tech-obsessed streets of Tokyo, to London to hobnob with digital cash gurus.
In Honolulu, he drinks Mai Tais with Bernard von NotHaus, a convicted counterfeiter and alternative-currency evangelist whom government prosecutors have labeled a domestic terrorist.
In Tokyo, he sneaks a peek at the latest anti-counterfeiting wizardry, while puzzling over the fact that banknote forgers depend on society’s addiction to cash. In a downtrodden Oregon town, he mingles with obsessive coin collectors — the people who are supposed to love cash the most, yet don’t. And in rural Georgia, he examines why some people feel the end of cash is Armageddon’s warm-up act. After stops at the Digital Money Forum in London and Iceland’s central bank, Wolman flies to Delhi, where he sees first-hand how cash penalizes the poor more than anyone–and how mobile technologies promise to change that.
Then it’s on to Reykjavik, where Icelanders are about to kill their national currency; Washington, to learn about high-tech counterfeiting; and Los Angeles, where scientists study our brains on cash. Along the way, Wolman examines the implications of next-generation payment innovations, investigates alternative and virtual currencies, and showcases the boon in mobile-phone banking. As cash gets pushed toward extinction, now is the time to explore its effect on our wallets and our lives. “The End of Money” is the story of hard currency – its history, conflicts, champions, detractors, and eventual demise. As the role of bills and coins in our everyday lives and in the economy lessens, real money is becoming not merely an abstraction, but an abstraction of an abstraction. What will an increasingly cashless future mean for society, and for the people whose careers are linked to the production, management, and collection of hard currency? This is their story, but it is also our story – because the fate of real money impacts all of our wallets.
Told with verve and wit, The End of Money explores an aspect of our daily lives so fundamental that we rarely stop to think about it. You’ll never look at a dollar bill the same again.
