Credit cards are said to be the new cash, and we use more of them than ever, but who's benefiting? Can the government monitor what we buy? Do people spend more when they don't have to hand over their cash?

Kids can now have Pay As You Go credit cards that their parents top up. Money is becoming a relic of the past. Everything we buy can be seen by the government- it’s just another way of monitoring and controlling the population. So how long will it be before the beloved metallic Pound becomes obsolete?

I think we need to define the difference between credit cards and top-up cards. Credit cards usually involve buying things now and paying later, often with interest on top. From a purely financial view this would be worse than carrying cash. Top-up cards are slightly better in that respect.

Since there is a financial cost to the retailer for processing electronic transactions, and they will be unwilling to pay this or raise the price of, for instance, penny sweets, to cover it, it is likely cash will continue to thrive in this sector as it already does.

Obviously no one wants to be carrying around enough cash to pay for a new computer, but for chocolate bars, donations to charity and so on, cash is perfect.