Criminalising cash

Recently, the Morrison government drafted legislation, provisionally called the “Currency (Restrictions on the use of cash) Bill” that, supposedly, was designed to stop the leakage of tax revenue. The legislation, when passed, will effectively put a ban on all cash transactions over $10,000. It will become a criminal offence, with a maximum penalty of two years jail and a $25,200 fine.

Digest that. Think about buying something privately: a car, some power tools, a bungalow for granny. You pay a cash amount exceeding $10,000, and someone receives it, you both go to jail. A receipt won’t exonerate you. It will only be an admission of “guilt”. Ponder, too, the surveillance net government will create in order to monitor transactions to ensure no evildoers slip through it. They are obviously determined, so those reconnaissance techniques will be even more far-reaching than ever. When those despotic measures to catch the “bad guys” are passed, they never actually catch the real bad guys. They merely oppress the average citizen.

Furthermore, it’s been suggested by movers and shakers like KPMG that this $10,000 ceiling is too high! They want to lower it to $5,000 or even $2,000! If ever you had any doubt about the expanding definition of “black economy”, now is the time for you to realise you are considered to be potentially part of it if you break this onerous law! Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand also enthusiastically welcomed this opportunity to thwart those who participate in the “black economy”.

This initiative is the most decisive nail yet in the coffin of the cash-based economy. I guess many people won’t realise they’ve forever traded the freedom of having cash in their pocket for something much more regulated, monitored, restrictive and sinister until physical money is gone forever. 

So, what’s really going on? If this is merely a local concern, as many seem to believe it is, it might be fixable by local means. But there’s no way one country can go cashless and remain viable if the rest of the world still relies on cold, hard pelf for its transactions, especially in today’s tightening global commercial net. The cashless phenomenon will happen worldwide, and, in fact, there’s a chance it might happen in a short timeframe. Conspiracy-minded economists have been warning us for a long time now that a “re-set” will be required in order for the world economy to became cashless. Others call this by other names. They imply pretty heavily that a global recession will be little more than a controlled demolition. Deliberate or not, it will happen.

Australia’s John Adams is one who has identified the international flavour of the cash closure initiative. He believes it’s not about tax revenue at all, but about the IMF making interest rates around the world “not just negative, but deeply negative.” The gist of his argument is that the IMF want to prepare us for a worldwide recession by setting interest rates at minus three or four percent. “Their view is that if you have a recession, interest rates have to be cut between 500 to 600 basis points. We’re already at one percent officially, so if we have a recession tomorrow, the IMF is expecting Australia to go to negative three, four, five percent (which has) never been done before in the course of human history.” According to Adams, the abolition of physical cash is intended to give central banks the “flexibility” to carry out these unprecedented actions. That’s a nice way of saying “complete and utter control”.

Control? Sounds menacing doesn’t it? But remember, this is an assault on choice. And cash is about choice.

Next week: Capitalism or democracy – which one is driving?