Why Doesn't America Switch to a Cash-Only Money-System?

The alternative that you are describing is the gold standard.This is when the amount of the currency in circulation is based on the size of a states gold reserves.This wouldn't be a good thing as it would increase the value of the currency this would make it's products more expensive,reducing the number of exports the state made.This would make it harder for the US to recover from the financial crisis and increase the amount of time it will take.

I guess that might be a good idea. I like spending cash sometimes instead of using my debit card, even though that uses 'real' money too and not credit, but just because it's easier to keep track of how much money you have left. That makes sense to me. But what would happen if we completely eliminated credit cards in general? Banks and credit card companies would go bankrupt. I can't see this happening because banks are probably the wealthiest companies/corporations in the world.

we used to have a "cash only" system, as a matter of fact, for the people--though the government did borrow money through bonds. "credit", as a part of economy, has been in use in societies for thousands of years--but here in the USA, "credit" as we have it now, unsecured debt, didn't happen until the first "credit card"--Western Union in 1921, though fuel cards had been around for a few years at that point. Then Charge a plate came in the 30's--a department store type card. Then the airlines began issuing cards,then Diner's Club and American Express in the 50's--but those were "charge cards" where the balance had to be paid off monthly. The concept of the card dates back to the 1880's. A Charge Card is actually a sound idea, and a good financial tool, in that you can budget well with one, and you're not carrying unsecured debt. Mortgages (another 20th century invention) and auto loans are also sound ideas, because they are secured--what you buy with them is your collateral. Even in an all cash, gold standard system (or some other form of tangible asset system--like rice, salt, etc) societies have always found a way to represent that tangible item--the Japanese, Chinese, Greeks and Romans all had forms of "checks", IOUs and letters of credit, for practical reasons. Consider that a Japanese koku was the amount of rice needed to feed one person for one year--about 330 POUNDS. If you were a feudal lord, who was buying a piece of land 300 miles from home for 20 koku--that's 6600 pounds. A lot of rice to haul around. Much easier for you to keep the rice in your granary, send a "check" to the buyer, and have the buyer present the "check" at his local granary--you would then either send the rice over o the next shipment, or sell the rice and send the money. Likewise now--if gold is 1500.00 an ounce, then you would have to have 100 ounces of gold to equal 150,000 dollars. That's not all that bad, under 8 pounds. But it's a lot easier to give someone a check, and a lot safer--because a stolen check is traceable, and stoppable--but stolen gold isn't. We could in theory eliminate all money that isn't backed by a tangible asset by going back on the gold standard, but to do so we need to eliminate the current debt, and have enough in reserve to cover future expenditures--and the rest of the world wouldn't pay us in gold, they would pay us in paper (which we would then have to exchange for gold on the open market). To get out from under the mess now, even if we cleared all the debt tomorrow, the government would probably have to resort to confiscation of privately held gold and nationalize gold and silver mines to accumulate a reserve. It's kind of like relationships--once you've been lovers, it's hard to go back to just holding hands, so to speak.