The other day I was in line at the grocery store and the lady in front of me was getting ready to pay.  The cashier asked her what form of payment she would be using and the customer said check.  The cashier said it’s almost unheard of as everyone was using their debit or credit cards for groceries.  When it was my turn, I indicated I would be paying by cash and the cashier, again surprised, stated no one was paying cash any more.

My first part-time job (@$1.25/hour) in high school was in the credit department of Lerner Shops.  I would approve or disapprove customers’ purchases on “layaway” based on their previous layaway payment records.  What a novel idea that was, you actually had to pay for the item before you got to take it home!  Of course, nowadays with credit cards, we get to take the item home before we ever even pay for it.

Recently a friend of mine went on a trip and left all her credit cards at home.  She had saved up cash and had just paid off her credit cards and didn’t want to incur any debt.  You probably know the outcome of this story: she had a rental car waiting, had the cash to pay for the entire bill and the rental agency wouldn’t take her cash.  She then wanted to pay by check and they wouldn’t take that either.  She ultimately called the credit card company to get approval; otherwise, she would have been stranded.

Did you know there is $957 billion owing in credit card debt?  That’s “billions”!  The average person carries $8,000 in credit card debt, $7 Billion owed are penalty fees, only 1/3 pay off their balances monthly, and 70% of all Americans have at least one credit card. 

When my parents bought their first home, and subsequent homes, they always paid cash.  Granted those prices were considerably lower in those days but it was still a lot of money even then.   However, I still have people pay “cash” for houses.  When they do, we Realtors® have to question the cash (is it on deposit, we need written proof of funds, where did the cash come from etc.)

If “Cash is King” why then can’t we use it and why are we being forced into using credit cards all the time?  You can’t order anything on line without a credit card and it’s nearly impossible to function in this world without credit.  Wouldn’t it be a far better idea if we all paid by cash and limited ourselves to only buying what we could afford? 

 

 

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