Rep. Donald Payne, Jr.106
Cannon HOB
Washington, DC 20515
Rep. Sylvia Garcia
1620 Longworth HOB
Washington, D.C. 20515
Rep. Chris Smith
2373 Rayburn HOB
Washington, D.C. 20515
August 5, 2021
Re: Support for the Payment Choice Act of 2021 (H.R. 4395)
Dear Representatives Payne, Smith and Garcia,
As advocates for the rights and interests of U.S. consumers, we are writing to express
our support for the Payment Choice Act (H.R. 4395)—legislation you have introduced as
original co-sponsors to preserve the option for people to pay for purchases with cash at
retail locations.
According to the FDIC’s Report on the Economic Well-Being of U.S. Households in 2020
(May 2021),1 18% of adults in the U.S. are unbanked or underbanked, meaning
approximately 37 million adults may lack access to digital forms of payment, including
credit or debit cards. This problem is worse for minority households; approximately 13%
of Black households and 9% of Hispanic households had no bank accounts at all in 2020,
according to the FDIC report. Adults with less education and adults with lower income
were more likely to be underbanked than the population as a whole. Nearly one-fourth
of those with less than a high school degree and 21% of those with incomes less than
$25,000 were underbanked.
All consumers should have the freedom to choose to pay with cash at grocery stores,
restaurants, and businesses. Unbanked and underbanked consumers have little access
to noncash forms of payment, with the possible exception of prepaid cards.
Furthermore, when consumers are forced to pay for goods and services in cashless
transactions, they (as well as the businesses where they shop) are also often forced to
incur added expenses in the form of network and transaction fees.
Another concern is that noncash transactions generate vast amounts of data, recording
the time, date, location, amount, and subject of each consumer’s purchase. Those data
are available to digital marketers and advertisers who are engaged in developing and
refining increasingly sophisticated techniques to identify and target potential customers.
Paying with cash provides consumers with significantly more privacy than do electronic
forms of payment. That is why even consumers who have credit and debit cards
sometimes prefer to pay with cash.
A 2021 study sponsored by Cardtronics, independently produced by Javelin Strategy &
Research,2 found that during the pandemic, cash rebounded faster than other payment
methods and remained the top way to make a purchase throughout 2020. Among
underbanked consumers, cash usage was significantly higher and steadier than among
average consumers, remaining at 78% usage throughout 2020, significantly higher than
the credit card (59%) and debit card (53%) usage seen in October 2020. The study
concluded that cash’s standing has remained strong—the majority of consumers
surveyed agreed that: cash protects my privacy and financial security (66%); allowing
people to pay in cash is important for society (63%); cash is safe to use (58%); cash is as
important today as it ever was (54%); cash is often the easiest way to pay (44%).
To protect consumers from discrimination and ensure that they have choices in
payment methods, some cities and states have enacted laws or ordinances3 that bar
brick-and-mortar retail stores from refusing to accept cash. States such as New Jersey,
Massachusetts and Rhode Island have laws in place that prohibit businesses from
banning cash. San Francisco, Philadelphia, and New York City also have passed similar
laws.
Some have used the pandemic as an excuse for not accepting cash, claiming it is unsafe.
Expert sources, however, have stated that currency does not present any increased risk
of COVID-19 transmission compared to plastic payment cards. According to a 2013 study
published in the Journal of Applied and Environmental Microbiology,4 American
currency, a porous surface, had an extremely low rate of virus transfer efficiency:
between 0.05% and 0.2%. Nonporous surfaces, such as hard plastic countertops and
credit card readers, had a transmission efficiency rate of up to 79.5 percent. Neither the
World Health Organization (WHO) nor the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
(CDC) have concluded5 that cash presents any more danger than credit cards or other
forms of payment.
What is true about the pandemic is that the economic dislocations it has caused have
fallen most directly and most harshly on the marginalized segments of our society: low-income
populations, people in inner-city neighborhoods and in rural areas, the
unemployed and underemployed, the elderly, and racial and ethnic minorities. It is
crucial for people to be able to obtain necessities at their local stores and restaurants
without being turned away because they want to pay with cash.
The enactment of the Payment Choice Act will ensure that all consumers in the United
States can make purchases in retail stores and restaurants using the payment methods
of their choice. We appreciate your leadership on this important issue and urge your
colleagues in Congress to support this legislation.
Very truly yours,
Affirm Merit
Alaska PIRG
Americans for Financial Reform
Center for Economic Integrity
Chicago Consumer Coalition
Chinese American Museum of Chicago
CLAP Community Lead Advocacy Program
Columbia Consumer Education Council
Connecticut Legal Services, Inc.
Consumer Action
Consumer Federation of America
Consumer Federation of California
Consumers for Auto Reliability and Safety
Delaware Community Reinvestment Action Council, Inc.
Electronic Frontier Foundation
Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC)
Empire Justice Center
Haven Neighborhood Services
Hawaii Consumers
Housing and Family Services of Greater New York
Kentucky Equal Justice Center
Legal Aid Justice Center
Mountain State Justice
Multi-Cultural Development Center
National Association of Consumer Advocates
National Consumer Law Center (on behalf of its low income clients)
National Fair Housing Alliance
National Network to End Domestic Violence
Oakland Privacy
Public Justice
Public Justice Center
R.A.A. - Ready, Aim, Advocate
Strike Debt Bay Area
The Collaborative NC
The Fairmont-Morgantown Housing Authority
THE ONE LESS FOUNDATION
The Parent Coalition for Student Privacy
Thrive Collective, LLC
University of Wisconsin Consumer Law Clinic
1 Report on the Economic Well-Being of U.S. Households in 2020 (May 2012), available at
https://www.federalreserve.gov/publications/2021-economic-well-being-of-us-households-in-2020-
executive-summary.htm.
2 Cardtronics, 2021 U.S. Health of Cash Study (February 2020), available at
https://www.cardtronics.com/landing/HealthOfCash.aspx.
3 McKenzie Sadeghi, "Fact check: No US law requires businesses to take cash, but local laws may mandate
it,” USA Today (Sept. 16, 2020), available at
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/09/16/fact-check-cashless-businesses-bannedonly-
some-local-state-laws/3330804001/.
4 Transfer Efficiency of Bacteria and Viruses from Porous and Nonporous Fomites to Fingers under
Different Relative Humidity Conditions (Sept. 15, 2013), available at
https://journals.asm.org/doi/full/10.1128/AEM.01030-13.
5 Meera Jagannathan, “World Health Organization: We did NOT say that cash was transmitting
coronavirus,” MarketWatch (March 9, 2020), available at https://www.marketwatch.com/story/who-wedid-
not-say-that-cash-was-transmitting-coronavirus-2020-03-06.