Although this form of payment is still used in primitive economies and on the fringes of developed ones, it suffers from the need to establish what is known as a double coincidence of wants . This means, for example, that a person wishing to exchange food for a bicycle must first find another person who is both hungry and has a spare bicycle. The next step in the progression of money was the use of tokens such as paper notes which were backed by deposits of gold and silver held by the note-issuer. This was referred to as adopting a commodity standard.
Cash is almost universally acceptable as a form of payment, regardless of the transaction amount.
One of the reasons why cash is so acceptable is that the physical handing over of the cash completes the transaction and there is no risk that the payment will not be honoured at a later stage. There is no authorization required and, consequently, no communications traffic or charges. Many other forms of payment involve a paper trail linking either or both parties with the transaction. Cash allows transactions to take place anonymously. In addition to being attractive to criminals, this also has appeal for perfectly honest consumers that are worried about the ability of large organizations to monitor their movements and lifestyle.