On 22/01/2012 21:52, Stephen Sprunk wrote:
On 22-Jan-12 09:23, Roland Perry wrote:
In , at 09:08:00 on Sun, 22 Jan
2012, Stephen remarked:
Many US retailers push for card use because they believe the labor and
fraud costs of handling cash are higher.

Do you mean the risk of counterfeit banknotes? This is something that
seems to have been overcome in the UK one way or another.

That's a risk in some countries, and even in the US many merchants won't
accept bills larger than $20 (though the risk is obviously the same
whether someone counterfeits a $100 bill or five $20 bills), but that's
not the real problem. Modern currency is very difficult to counterfeit
well enough to pass even a cursory examination.

Most people in the Eurozone are reluctant to accept 50-euro notes. I
think that they were even planning to pull the 500-euro note.

There's also the time it takes to count the customer's money and, if
applicable, make change. This is particularly bad in the US since taxes
are not included in the price, so the total due is rarely known before
the order is rung up.

Why is that, I wonder? I think that is also the case with the GST and
PST in Canada.

Here in many (if not all) parts of Europe, the price that you pay for
something already has relevant taxes figured in.