June 17, 2008: Pretty Money

[glatt]

I read a few weeks ago that a federal appeals court ruled that the US bills discriminate against blind people because you can't tell them apart by feel. Many other countries have bills of different sizes to denote different values. In the US, blind people have to rely on others to help them prepare their money in special ways so they can keep track of the various denominations.

So we may see some significant changes to the US money relatively soon.

[wolf]

Originally Posted by glatt

I read a few weeks ago that a federal appeals court ruled that the US bills discriminate against blind people because you can't tell them apart by feel. Many other countries have bills of different sizes to denote different values. In the US, blind people have to rely on others to help them prepare their money in special ways so they can keep track of the various denominations.

So we may see some significant changes to the US money relatively soon.

Other than the attack of the Monopoly money, I don't see that happening. Come on, we can't even switch over to a dollar coin here. I do suspect a conspiracy involving the vending industry ... which would also block the differently sized bills. I already have enough trouble getting vending machines to accept bills!

[Aliantha]

Originally Posted by wolf

Other than the attack of the Monopoly money, I don't see that happening. Come on, we can't even switch over to a dollar coin here. I do suspect a conspiracy involving the vending industry ... which would also block the differently sized bills. I already have enough trouble getting vending machines to accept bills!

We have different sized notes here and vending machines seem to manage them ok although with some vending machines they will only accept 5's or 10's for example.

A lot of them still just take coins though, but since our coins go all the way up to $2, usually anything you want from a vending machine is managed with that.