This article incorrectly said that more than 350 million Americans carry a debit card. According to the Nilson Report, an industry publication, about 77 percent of Americans have debit cards, a figure that represents 210 million cards linked to bank accounts and 100 million prepaid cards.
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A Hotel On Boardwalk? Card It
(AP)
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Cash in hand means a different way of thinking. Barton said the traditional version of Monopoly allows players to try to assess their competitors' wealth by scanning the stacks of cash. Experts put a $1 bill at the top and bottom of the pile and hide their big money inside, he said. Those tactics won't work if players have bank cards. And, as several other players pointed out, the electronic system makes it harder to cheat.
Barton, who moved to Idaho last year, said he still has his first game of Monopoly. The bills are curved and tattered from years of little boys clutching them tightly inside their fists.
"You pick that up and you feel like you're holding something real," he said. "With a debit card, you don't see it, it's invisible, which is sort of a mirror to our own economy."
Others bemoan the impression card-swiping may leave on impressionable young minds. "It gets kids used to the idea of using credit cards instead of cash," said Susan Linn, director of the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood. "The credit card companies are hoping that this will translate into kids using them as adults."
Linn said The Game of Life is particularly egregious because the check card carries the Visa name. Monopoly and Mall Madness use generic bank cards.
Riso said that Life is designed so that players who are not financially responsible cannot win. In addition, the game comes with real life financial tips about everything from student loans to car payments.
At the Target on Leesburg Pike in Falls Church, Sarah Given of Annandale scanned the wall of board games. She said she plays Monopoly Junior with her 4- and 6-year-old children, and they love counting the money. She recalled her own excitement at earning the colored bills when she was a child.
"That was the whole point," Given said. The bank card "kind of takes away a little bit from it."
On the other hand, Given said her kids are well-acquainted with swiping a check card.
"They see me do it all the time," she said.
