[battani]

Yes I agree that bitcoin could be useful to the unbanked or in high inflation countries. I don't have enough knowledge of those markets to elaborate.

I was answering the author who was advocating bitcoin's ease of use as compared to credit cards.

Credit card use is not a limited world view though. Credit card networks are pervasive all over the world. And in the areas they aren't, I don't think a volatile digital asset is at the forefront of people's minds when it comes to payments. A lot of innovation is being put in place to eliminate card use and opt instead for the mobile phone/wallet, connected directly to a bank account in fiat, government-regulated currency.

It would be useful to know why those 30% of Americans don't have a debit/credit card. Is it an infrastructure problem? Is going online and buying things part of their day-to-day activities?

And for those areas of high credit card fraud, what do merchants do now? Accept checks, cash, ACH? And what do consumers do if they receive subpar merchandise? Etc.

[pmorici]

"And for those areas of high credit card fraud, what do merchants do now?"

Nothing, they lose out on the sale.

"It would be useful to know why those 30% of Americans don't have a debit/credit card."

Typically because of past financial difficulties. If you've got a bad credit record, or have a history of over drafting your bank account banks will refuse to work with you.

As an aside if you subscribe to the idea that Bitcoins transaction mechanism is the valuable aspect of it then the value of a Bitcoin is going to have to rise enough to handle the value of the transactions that pass through it. It can't be worth zero and still work.