Buy Canadian

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A community dedicated to buying Canadian products.

Une communauté dédiée à l'achat de produits Canadiens.

Rules:

1. Posts must be related to buying Canadian-made goods and / or using Canadian-owned services

2. Absolutely no bigotry will be tolerated. This includes, but is not limited to, racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, etc.

3. AI Content Policy

Not allowed: AI-generated images or articles

Tolerated: AI-generated post summaries

4. Only content in French and English is permitted

5. Declare all self-promotion

Users are encouraged to report any content that violates our community guidelines

Règlements :

1. Les poteaux doivent être en lien avec l'achat de produits et / ou de services opérés par des canadiens

2. Aucune bigoterie ne sera tolérée. Ça comprend, mais sans se limiter à, le racisme, le sexisme, l’homophobie, la transphobie, etc.

3. Politique sur le contenu IA

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Les utilisateurs sont encouragés à signaler tout contenu qui ne respecte pas nos directives communautaires

Related communities: Communautés connexes :

!buyeuropean@feddit.uk !buyafrican@baraza.africa !boycottus@lemmy.ca !canada@lemmy.ca !canada@lemmy.ml ___

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478

Let's stop dicking around and talk about ditching something big: Visa and Mastercard (lemmy.ca)

submitted 20 hours ago* (last edited 19 hours ago) by Albbi@lemmy.ca to c/buycanadian@lemmy.ca

110 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Visa and Mastercard are American companies, and they essentially tax everybody by taking a percentage of purchase prices for themselves. Not exactly a small percentage either, 1.2% to 2.65%. Ever wonder why so many merchants say they don't accept American Express? That's because they charge quite a bit more to merchantes, 50% more than Visa or Mastercard. Anyway, we're letting American companies tax us and we love them because we get rewards when we use cards. But it's just a shell game because we pay more up front because businesses need to charge more to make up for payment processing charges. They get to sit in the middle and rake in the money.

Now the alternative in Canada is Interac. Interac charges a set amount per transcation. How much? 2 to 5.5 cents. Unless you're going through Apple or Google Pay, and then it's a percentage again.

Interac is also Canadian.

Want to stick it to Trump? Stop using credit cards (and Google Pay or Apple Pay) and switch to Interac. Want to make Canada better? Stop using credit cards and switch to Interac. Is it going to be inconvenient? Yes. Online shopping will be much harder but I have seen online Interac payments before and we can ask our favourite Canadian merchants to accept Interac online.

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[–] knightly@pawb.social 51 points 18 hours ago (16 children)

I work for an American credit card company, and my advice is to ditch credit and debit cards entirely. Use cash.

[–] CosmicTurtle0@lemmy.dbzer0.com 25 points 15 hours ago (3 children)

Credit cards (when used correctly) is one of the few pro consumer products we have left.

Most cards come with fraud protection, something you cannot get with cash, checks, or gift cards.

Similarly, most cards come with purchase protections like extended warranties. I have a credit card that gives me free damage protection on my cell phone so long as I pay the monthly bill with it.

I'm not saying cash isn't great but there are good reasons to use a credit card. At least for now.

[–] knightly@pawb.social 7 points 15 hours ago (2 children)

I don't think those benefits are worth it when you consider the cost of having your purchase history and personal data for sale to anyone who wants it.

[–] SendPrudes@lemm.ee 6 points 14 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago) (1 children)

Yeah one of the few fixes to our shitty situation is to end surveillance capitalism. It’s deconstructing our behaviors trending them and exploiting them vs ourselves and the people around us.

Cash becomes a component of a healthy surveillance free (ish) lifestyle. But you probably wouldn’t be posting on any internet site if you were all in on it enough for swapping over to cash to matter. haha.

[–] knightly@pawb.social 2 points 12 hours ago

Eh, the job comes with certain expectations, they don't even have cash tills in the cafeteria.

I use my credit cards just enough to generate a plausibly normal profile, and cash for everything else.

I've been looking for a more ethical job, but the market for tech work is real fucked up right now..

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