Greenbacks No More 1387
Chacham writes "The Financial Times has an article about the US adding colors to some denominations of US currency. Apparently, with both size and color the same, foreigners have a hard time differenciating between the bills.I still haven't gotten used to the larger pictures. And now this? As Kermit the frog sang, It's not easy being green." The Federal Reserve has a press release. At least there's no mention of RFID tags.
No more green (Score:4, Interesting)
Australian 'bills' (Score:3, Interesting)
apparently we were the first country to use polymer notes...
two good links are here [go.com] and here [questacon.edu.au]
and this shows all our polymer notes [geocities.com]
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Confusing Currency! (Score:4, Interesting)
currency tracking hardly needs rfids (Score:4, Interesting)
The biggest thing heading our way in that department is a nationally linked serial number scanning system. Basically, since virtually all stores have laser scanners already, and a strong desire to avoid getting fed counterfeits (since they lose the counterfeit money without reparation), stores will be offered the opportunity to scan the money you hand them, and have a unique serial number checked against a national database. Money being used at multiple locations at the same time can be flagged as counterfeit, and refused by the stores.
The big benefit to the FBI comes when they can then follow money virtually every time it is spent. It can even be correlated with time stamped receipts at the stores to see what was bought.
A portion of this system is already in place in a number of banks, which have better scanners that work with the existing money supply, but in the next generation of currency, there will be a small bar code on the upper right edge of the currency for this purpose.
Its a pretty cool system, and should really help to cut down on organized crime.
Cold, Hard Sentiment (Score:5, Interesting)
Given that money is meant to be representational, and given that the different bills represent entirely different amounts, it only makes sense to distinguish them from one another as much as possible.
I once met someone working within the US treasury and took the opportunity to ask him why they didn't take advantage of color printing. He reckoned that it was politics more than anything else; no politician wanted to be the one to suggest changing something with which Americans identify so strongly. I guess it's a bit like the British being sentimental about the pound despite all the jobs and markets they're losing to Ireland and the other countries who've adopted the Euro.
how about real change? (Score:4, Interesting)
While they're at it, howsabout some real change in the bills - like changing who's on them?
Start with the $20. Jackson. How did this genocidal maniac, who laid the seeds of the Trail of Tears, who shattered the Constitutional balance of power by ignoring rulings of the Supreme Court, who appointed Taney (who authored the Dred Scott decision) to that same court, end up honored with a place on our money?
Bad Idea: We'll lose brand recognition (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:currency tracking hardly needs rfids (Score:2, Interesting)
So much for remaining untraceable by paying cash. I think this is the most Big Brother-esque thing I've ever heard.
Re:Foreigners? (Score:3, Interesting)
Not for foreigners (Score:5, Interesting)
The newest Canadian bills are not only different colours, but they have braille, a special glossy maple leaf overlay, and a bunch of pressed on 'dots' which, with some difficulty, can be peeled off to prove they are not just printed on. All of these things (except, perhaps, the braille) are primarily to stop counterfeiting.
... and guess what: I use both Canadian and U.S. currency every day, and the different colours of Canadian money make it wayyy easier to differentiate different denominations.
Consider this, many times, you just went to a bank machine and got $100 as five $20 bills. Then you buy a pack of gum to break one of the twenties. Later, when you go to pay for something that's $4.95, and you want to find that $5 bill you know is in your wallet, it's MUCH easier to just look for a blue piece of paper, rather than looking at the writing on each individual bill. Maybe it only saves you 5 or 10 seconds, but if you're in a line with 5 or 10 people, and each person takes 5 or 10 seconds longer, that adds up over the course of a day.
Besides that, twice in the last two years, someone giving me change in the U.S. has tried to pass off a $1 as a $10. I noticed it, but I wonder how many times they actually succeed?
Re:how about real change? (Score:4, Interesting)
The Second Bank of the United States was established in 1816, and quickly became one of the most influential institutions in the world. Many people regarded the privately owned bank which wielded independent of the government as a dangerous and anti-democratic institution, benefitting the rich at the expense of the working class and heavily tied to foreign interests. Or as banker Meyer Rothschild wrote, "Let me issue and control a nation's currency and I care not who writes its laws." No person fought so hard and so opposed the bank as the populist Andrew Jackson, who once famously remarked "The bank...is trying to kill me, but I will kill it!" In 1836 Jackson vetoed the bill to renew it's charter, and considered it one of the greatest accomplishments of his career. However, following the panic of 1907 the Federal Reserve was established, for all intents and purposes identical to it's predecessors.
It is with considerable irony that Jackson's visage now appears appears on the $20 bill, beneath the words "Federal Reserve Note".
You're all missing the point. (Score:2, Interesting)
Advantages:
Vastly more efficient recognition of denominations.
Easier to use for the poor-sighted.
Denominations can be recognised at a distance by merely a brief glance.
Disadvantages:
It's what everyone's used to.
The advantages vastly outweigh the disadvantages. And I'm sorry, but calling everyone stupid for not wanting to stop and read every single note does not count as an argument against the coloured notes.
Not so good... (Score:2, Interesting)
"Wait, was that a $20...or a $2...?"
Subtle colors don't do well with me, and I imagine that, unless we start having Peter Max design our money, the colors are going to lean more towards the pastel end of the spectrum.
ObCanadian: I'm married to a Canadian, and I hear this rant about the mono-chromatic money *all* the time. To me, Canadian money looks like I should be using it to put houses on Park Place....
wish they'd be a little more radical... (Score:2, Interesting)
Here are some of the people and things I'd love to see on there instead of what we've currently got:
- the Grand Canyon, Monument Valley or Mt. Ranier
- the Statue of Liberty or the Golden Gate Bridge
- Martin Luther King or Harriet Tubman
- Edgar Allen Poe, Mark Twain, Walt Whitman or John Muir
- Duke Ellington, Aaron Copland or John Coltrane
- beautiful birds like the Eastern Bluebird or the Great Blue Heron (OK, I know we've already got the Bald Eagle)
Imagine a beautiful full color panorama of the Grand Canyon on the back of a 20 instead of the White House... wouldn't that be nicer?The list could go on and on and on... but those are just a few ideas I've had ever since they did the first redesign in the 90's. I guess the US government is too busy trying to create an image of grandeur to actually use symbols that come from the country's cultute and natural heritage.
Don't get me wrong, I think it would be OK to leave guys like Washington and Jefferson on there - they are some of the founders of the country and deserve to be represented. But having some more focus on culture as opposed to government as the things symbolic of our country would be nice. You know, "of the people, by the people, for the people..."
Re:Huh? (Score:2, Interesting)
[ fx: whisper, stage left ]
Oh, some people are blind?
It appears that some countries [ hint: "colour", "defence" ] have bills of different sizes... That sounds suspiciously un-American...
Cash counting problems (Score:2, Interesting)
Notes have to be sorted first to ensure that a bundle is all 10's for example. In Europe, if a 100 is slipped in by mistake, the counting machine will stop because the note is a different size. In the US, the 100 will get counted as a 10 (or vice versa). Hence fewer mistakes and less sorting time for the coloured and different size notes.
If you want to go ahead pissing money down the drain - be my guest. But don't go all superior and claim we can't read numbers. I can - but poor sighted (not blind) people from anywhere in the world can have problems telling the difference between 10 & 20 dollar bills.
Re:Trouble? (Score:3, Interesting)
coins on the other hand are a whole different story...
plastic money (Score:3, Interesting)
Unfortunately, everyone else hated the idea, so it was dropped.
Re:currency tracking hardly needs rfids (Score:2, Interesting)
That doesn't seem to make any sense. Say I am at Walmart and the guy in front on me uses a $5 bill to make a purchase, then I receive his $5 bill at part of my change. As I'm walking out, I see a display of batteries that I remember I need, so I pick some up and go to the next checkout counter. I might use the $5 bill to pay for them. Now, that same $5 bill was used just a minute ago, but that doesn't mean it's counterfeit.
Or I could receive a $5 bill at an airport shop, just before I get on a plane. If I use that $5 bill in another part of the country in another hour or three, that still doesn't mean it's counterfeit.
And if "being used in multiple locations at the same time" means "at the exact same time", then they are probably not going to catch too many counterfeit bills.
If it means "within a few hours" (or whatever time period, really), then they are going to be getting a whole lot of false positives.
I just don't see how this could work at all.
Re:Change in the infastructure (Score:2, Interesting)
Or the loonie?
Sure we're a small country, but that's still a *very* *big* *change* *in* *money*