> If cash is legal tender, then any amount is, by default, legal.
Cash being "legal tender" means that, if someone sues you and wins a judgment, you're entitled to pay the judgment in cash.
It doesn't mean that anyone willing to exchange a service or item for any random service or item is also compelled to exchange their thing for cash. If they demand a live sheep, you'll give them a live sheep or do without whatever they're offering.
Nobody is talking about being compelled to accept cash - we are talking about cash being used in a manner that is, arbitrarily illegal after a certain amount.
What were you saying "If cash is legal tender, then any amount is, by default, legal" meant? The only meaning of "legal tender" is that someone with a court judgment against you can be compelled to accept legal tender. It doesn't say anything about whether it's legal for you to use it in other transactions.
“ Legal tender is anything recognized by law as a means to settle a public or private debt or meet a financial obligation, including tax payments, contracts, and legal fines or damages. The national currency is legal tender in practically every country. ”
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/l/legal-tender.asp
I’m sorry my use of the word “legal” in the context of “legally acceptable tender” triggered this response. You’ll have to forgive me: English is my first language.
I will try again:
The use of cash, if agreed upon by parties involved, is legal because it’s a government “backed”/“accepted” item of currency. Tendering cash in this transaction is legal. (You’re not trading a car for $value in meth or guns..)
A gov is now saying, no matter how legal the use of cash is, after a certain amount it is no longer legal.
This is, in my opinion and with my beliefs, an overreach and quite frankly nonsense. It is no surprise, but saddening all the same. That is all.
> The use of cash, if agreed upon by parties involved, is legal because it’s a government “backed”/“accepted” item of currency. Tendering cash in this transaction is legal.
This is false. You immediately provide an example that shows it's false:
> (You’re not trading a car for $value in meth or guns..)
The fact that cash may be provided to settle a debt, even when the creditor doesn't want it, does not mean that it's legal to transact in cash. Meth could be legal tender too, and in that case it would remain illegal to transact in meth.
> I’m sorry my use of the word “legal” in the context of “legally acceptable tender” triggered this response. You’ll have to forgive me: English is my first language.
As another native speaker, I'm sure you're aware that the phrase "legal tender" has no colloquial meaning or use, and while "tender" does, the colloquial meanings are restricted to senses having to do with gentleness or sensitivity to touch.
I am speaking *nothing* about compelling the use of cash between two parties.
My only and consistent point that is that it is silly for a nation to put a ceiling amount on its currency (cash) trading hands in physical meatspace form.
For the amount will stay while inflation will not and the cohort of people “bumping” into this limit will increase over time.
It’s not about compelling cash. Move away from that.
It’s about a nation limiting the amount that can be used in the “name” of “fighting terrorism.”
If stopping crime involves treating normal people (in my country they are called “innocent”) like criminals via a transaction limit that may change with a vehicle so important as cash… then the method is unjust. A nation has no right to, in the name of “fighting terrorists”, accidentally consider or treat an innocent person as a criminal.
That's not what legal tender means, and the expression "boot out of your mouth" is a new one to me. Perhaps you meant the more derogatory "foot out of your mouth"?
> Get the boot out of your mouth. If cash is legal tender, then any amount is, by default, legal.
The concept of what is and isn’t “legal tender” is pretty extreme in the US compared to many other places. E.g many (most?) countries routinely takes bank notes out of circulation and make them worthless. But this isn’t so much about whether is legal tender but more about KYC laws: your €20K is no good to me as payment for a car if my bank won’t accept it in a deposit without a lot of hassle.
> Stop pretending the government (any) has the “average” man’s best interest
I like my government. I believe it operates with the best interest of the majority in mind. Why would they not? I elected them? It doesn’t consist of shadowy bureaucrats with hard- to-decide motives as far as I can see. They usually make laws with public support and have to answer when making impopular laws. The whole “governments are universally bad” thing is sad. Are people accepting living in democracies they experience working so poorly that they believe government has its own - or worse someone else’s - best interest in mind.
> I like my government. I believe it operates with the best interest of the majority in mind.
Yeah, I used to believe that too.
> Are people accepting living in democracies they experience working so poorly that they believe government has its own - or worse someone else’s - best interest in mind.
Yes, unfortunately. And that's something people learn to accept because 1) most people are not aware that governments could work better, and 2) even if they know governments could work better, it's not clear to them how to achieve that, and 3) even when there are governments that already work better, it's not easy to move to another country, be it due to friends, family, lack of jobs in your expertise, language barriers, cultural barriers, different climate, strict immigration policies, etc.
And even when you can move to another country, many countries still have most of the same underlying problems with government, because even when there is genuine interest in solving the problems (which is rare), their root causes are never actually solved (or at least, not effectively).
Adding: most “democracies” are not truly democratic - representative governments are, “proxy” or “hopeful” or “you promised!” democratic but not democratic.
Add in the layers of “manufactured consent” and you get… this to help “fight” “terrorism.”
You’re kidding, right? Average people buy cars with cash: a teen saving from first jobs for a first used car… eventually, “10k” will be where “teen” used cars land … and boom, average person.
A person with a down payment on a house.
…I can go on.
The point is this: casting this wide a net in the name of “fighting terrorists” is absolute nonsense, and not worth what would happen to a terrorist in this net: a few extra “10k money limit” charges… compared to the literal thousands of people this will inconvenience.
Anything a nation does in the name of fighting an enemy that is, in essence, a version of Lacan’s “objet petit a” - is a nation lying to its people.
It's the same in the UK, and has been for years. I'm glad there are people objecting to a limit on transactions made in physical cash, but it feels a bit ridiculous to suggest that such a limit would actually massively inconvenience people in general.
This law makes it not fully legal tender (after amount X). It is disgusting.
Stop pretending the government (any) has the “average” man’s best interest. Stop pretending they care.