Credit/Debit Cards Have Long Been Called Plastics, Over Time They're Becoming More Like Pure Plastics
They cost less than a dollar to manufacture: "The contact card is the cheapest form of EMV card, and that’s a big reason why it’s the most popular variety. Such cards cost about 90 cents to $1.40 per unit, depending on volume..."
With the exception of fairly tiny metallic chips, bank-issued cards are just flat slabs of plastic (maybe oversimplifying that a little, it's a certain kind of plastic). Each year they remove more and more things from them, sans holograms. Embossed writings? Nope. Magnets? Barely. At some point most people forget what those cards used to be like (young people never saw that, so there's nothing to forget); one might assume there will be no option left but a "smartphone" with a special proprietary chip (those exist already).
Some nostalgic (older) people - those who don't judge other people by the perceived cost of their "smartphone" - are still attached to "status" of cards with 'tiers', boasting they have some gold or platinum card (actually plastic that's coloured, they no longer put actual metal coating on those) as if to signal "class" or supposed "importance". "You're only bronze, I am silver!" It's infantile and pathetic, more so if those are credit (debt) cards that symbolise being indebted, unlike debit cards where the balance is an enigma, sometimes an unknown by design.
The technology associated with such cards (and card readers) is laughable and they can introduce far more security lapses than they address or claim to tackle. They give an illusion of (false) complexity when in practice things like "touchless" only render theft much easier (no PINs need be entered, not even physical contact with fingerprints left behind).
Each year when the bank sends out cards it seems like there's less and less to them. It's just some thing without even a name (except at the back), cheaply made and mass-produced.
Remember that newer is not always better. In many cases, newer is easier to cheat, break, imitate, or intercept. How many ATMs use Wi-Fi (radio for connection)? █
Image source: Money Crumpled Over Credit Card