Digital economy: Show me the money

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Digital economy: Show me the money
Tulsathit Taptim
The Nation

BANGKOK: -- When something is digitalised, it changes its values and essence. "Digital economy", the buzz word of today, is no exception. "Money" is no longer what we know it. Our "wealth" exists in a parallel universe. The question is how we cope with the phenomenon, which is something that must have made our great-grandparents drop to the floor and roll with laughter.

I bought a car recently without having to touch a single baht of "real" cash. The "reservation" deposit was an ATM transfer to the salesman’s account. The downpayment was a cashier check "bought" at a bank counter through my bank book. All of you must have gone through the same, but it still feels weird, though. I drove a brand-new Mazda sedan out of the showroom after some computerized buttons had been pushed. How amazing, or effective, or vulnerable the whole process is. Or the entire concept of money, for that matter.

Money doesn’t "change hands" any more. It’s numbers going down in some books and up in others. In an American series, The Good Wife, there is this one scene where someone wanted to pay for something in a big amount of cash and the cash wasn’t to be accepted. The receiver demanded a cashier check. The person making the payment wondered out loud why one would want a piece of paper more than real money.

In The Wolf of Wall Street, there’s a tell-tale dialogue showing how casual, or twisted, the definition of "wealth" has become. A senior broker said the following to our hero, which may make you want to withdraw all your money from investment funds: "So, you’ve got a client who brought stock at eight, and it now sits at sixteen, and he’s all (beep) happy, he wants to cash it and liquidate and take his (beep) money and run home. You don’t let him do that cause that would make it real."

All the wolves do is give you another brilliant idea so you re-invest. And you keep doing it again and again and again, partly because you are addicted and partly because you think you’re rich, which you are, on paper. The wolves take the hard cash and live like kings. You are happy seeing your numbers going up in your books.

The world has come a long way since the ancestors of our ancestors traded pigs for ducks, or rugs for some chinas. Money was invented because pig owners may not need ducks right away. Somewhere along the road, the concept of saving money earned from sale of pigs so that ducks or rugs or chinas can be bought later morphed into betting the money on how rugs that you don’t bother to buy will find buyers on the other side of the world.

And through it all, real money has kept disappearing into nowhere. There is a lot more "money" now than at any point in history, but we may be seeing a lot less money now than at any point in history as well. It’s too cynical to call what’s happening a make-believe system, so an "edge-of-a-slippery-slope" system, maybe?

They talk about gold reserves, something they claim can prevent digital numbers representing wealth from being cooked up and growing out of control. I have a bad feeling that if everyone in this world lay their digital wealth on the table and match it with the existing gold, we will need a lot more gold that will never come.

You may say "It’s about credits, you fool." That’s fair. I wouldn’t carry Bt7 million in hard cash around looking for a condo. You can’t pay for a Boeing in banknotes. The question is, are we giving too much credit to the term "credit"? Make no mistake. "Digital economy" is great. But if you are a world-class hacker, you must be saying the same thing, too.

Yet hackers may be the least of our concern. My point is "printing money out of thin air" will or can become something primeval. Digital economy makes everybody’s life, not just hackers’, a lot more convenient. Will corporate fraud be easier? Will countries lying about their economic healths become more common and harder to prove?

We heard stories about folks who put cash in pots or jars and buried them on the backyards. We laughed. Well, at least they knew exactly where their money was and could actually "see" it when they wanted to. Most of us trust numbers that people we don’t know, have interests of their own and rely on somebody else who rely on somebody else who rely on somebody else, tell us.

They say evil’s greatest trick is convince the world it doesn’t exist. But if money is evil, that wisdom surely has to be reversed. Evil’s (money’s) greatest trick, now it appears, must be it has managed to make the world rest assured that it exists.

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/opinion/Digital-economy-Show-me-the-money-30254812.html


-- The Nation 2015-02-25

[BigBadGeordie]

Welcome to the 1990's, a cashless society, pleased to see your starting to catch up!

[noitom]

This Thai doesn't realize that that's thee way it always was. Money doesn't get "made" it just gets transferred. The only people who can make money are the central banks by printing.

[ronwparker]

Thai banking is getting better but still it takes a long time and you have to go to your branch,use ATM machine.I even had to draw out 150,000 baht in cash and physically take it to transfer it to my account in SCB in the same mall in Chiangmai!

[brain150]

Money is created from PRIVATE BANKS out of thin air !!!

[that's why anybody has to pay tax ... to pay back the interest]

If anybody thinks a cashless society is something "good" - think again !

If there is somebody who can destroy your whole life by simply pressing a button [cancel your credit]

then we talk about full out scale TOTAL control !!! ... anybody wants to have this ?

The article is actually pretty well written and very true ... the simple minded won't see this though.

Learn where money comes from, how it is created and from whom !!! Don't guess ... KNOW !!!

[h90]

Welcome to the 1990's, a cashless society, pleased to see your starting to catch up!

I think in the 1990 I didn't see any cashier checks anymore in Europe. There you had checks at home and you could simply fill in the number you needed and the receiver got the money on his bank account. No need go to the bank for it with the bank book. Yes it seems 1990 is just beginning here.

"The downpayment was a cashier check "bought" at a bank counter through my bank book."

Tomorrow: "The slide rule has no future as pocket computers entering the market."

[Srikcir]

"through it all, real money has kept disappearing into nowhere. There is a lot more "money" now than at any point in history"

Sad this "reporter" didn't have a real economist review his article for accuracy. Of course there is more money now that ever. It's not because money is disappearing into nowhere but because the world economy has grown beyond what it has ever been in history.

And what does economic growth require? CAPITAL. A lot of capital. More capital than seashells on the beach or gold in the ground, and more portable and durable to possess.

[alocacoc]

Thai banking is getting better but still it takes a long time and you have to go to your branch,use ATM machine.I even had to draw out 150,000 baht in cash and physically take it to transfer it to my account in SCB in the same mall in Chiangmai!

Then you misunderstanding something. Thai Online Banking is very easy to use. Whether you want to transfer to another account or to a 3rd party account. No need to use a ATM and no need to visit your branch. When you confirm the transaction, a few seconds later the transaction is completely done and both parties get the confirmation by sms and / or email.

Even top up your sim card is easy and many things more.

Edited February 25, 2015 by alocacoc

[Dogmatix]

The OP failed to grasp that Digital Economy in Thailand is currently a code word for new laws to stifle freedom of expression even further. The government has no clue about or interest in e-commerce.

[BigBadGeordie]

Thai banking is getting better but still it takes a long time and you have to go to your branch,use ATM machine.I even had to draw out 150,000 baht in cash and physically take it to transfer it to my account in SCB in the same mall in Chiangmai!

Then you misunderstanding something. Thai Online Banking is very easy to use. Whether you want to transfer to another account or to a 3rd party account. No need to use a ATM and no need to visit your branch. When you confirm the transaction, a few seconds later the transaction is completely done and both parties get the confirmation by sms and / or email.

Even top up your sim card is easy and many things more.

I do not know where you live, but where I live (excluding major supermarkets, gas stations etc..) it is a cash only society.