Whose face is on the money?

If you are like me, these strips of paper are foreign currency. I haven’t reached for a bill in forever to pay for anything. I’ve got a wallet full of them that are just getting dusty.

Everything is plastic now.

That is unless your phone is smarter than mine and you just point and shoot and the laser lights and satellites pay the bill.

Back in the day, after the barter system, paper bills printed and provided by the government through the banking system indicated your wealth. The numbers in your bankbook indicated the number of paper bills you had in reserve to spend.

 If you had stacks of gold bullion or acres of land or castles and garage full of cars and planes passed down through ancestors, the sawbuck in your pocket meant you could get the ride home or not.

The credit card ruined the value of using paper and coin, but they are still around. They still can pay for a pizza delivery or be handed over in a robbery.

There are artisans who are furiously designing and redesigning this printed-paper to fort counterfeiters from reproducing George, Abe, Tom, Ulysses, or Andy on other paper and passing it off for real. Why is Tom on two bills and what about Ben? He wasn’t a president.

Still all these faces are of famous personalities from ancient times. Other worldly currency also has images of Kings and Queens from days gone by…. but why?

Is it prestige to have an image you heard about in history class on your money? Are these figures familiar anymore? Do they represent our nation like the constitution and declaration of independence or are they forgotten idols of a previous time?

Note: They is all white?

Is this 2020 currency? Should ‘money’ now represent our new world order? Where are the women? Where are the LGBTQ? Where is the color other than green?

In a basement of some governmental agency artists are trying to recreate a long forgotten style of metal scribes with a 21^st century take. Just check the border details. Images are embedded in the paper so the cashier has to hold it up to the light to see if it’s real.

There are lots of different designs to currency throughout the world and the changing of script is a fascinating study in economics.

When money, no matter who’s picture is printed on it, becomes worthless it is nothing more than toilet paper.

Now coins are a different matter.

The jingle jangle of change in your pocket meant your could ride the bus or play the pinball machine but little else. Copper pennies became worthless years ago but they are still minted.

The coin did show some diversity. There were indigenous people, women, and most recently an assassinated president. You still got George and Tom and Abe and somehow FDR made it to a dime. Susan B. Anthony made the dollar coin for a short while but went out of print.

Try dropping a silver dollar at McDonald’s and see what happens.

No matter what the online banking account tells you, there is some sort of currency needed to buy milk and bread when it snows.

Plus strippers don’t take change.