Montana Public Radio reports about artist Tim Holmes, who's dying money blue and giving it away. He also stamps it with the phrase, "Based on the value of a clean world!" He hopes this will prompt a widespread discussion about environmentalism. Why? Because the money is blue. He elaborates at his website
bluebills.us:
Regular green bills express no value. The money we use every day is backed by NOTHING! Its only value is what others think it has. But when two people exchange a Blue Bill, both agree on the value of a clean environment and a healthy community. Every exchange thus is a vote for a clean world!
So green = "no value" but blue = "clean environment and a healthy community". Got it?
It's a long-standing tradition in the media to come out with stupid tax stories around April 15. Here's one from 1955.
Jo-Jo Kay the parakeet was paid $615 a year by the Kay Jewelry chain to go around to their stores and say the phrase "It's Okay to owe Kay." Of this money, $20.50 went to income tax and $12.30 to Social Security. However, Jo-Jo claimed $25 in deductible travel expenses and $1 in charitable contributions (given to the zoo). This dropped his total income to $589, which was less than the $600 personal exemption. So Jo-Jo asked for a refund.
The IRS responded by pointing out that Kay Jewelry wasn't paying Jo-Jo the minimum wage, which meant they were liable to have their property (including Jo-Jo) seized as a penalty.
The picture shows Jo-Jo standing on the head of Internal Revenue Commissioner T. Coleman Andrews. [
Milwaukee Sentinel — Jun 24, 1955]
Always good to keep your sense of humor in hard economic times.
Perhaps it's wise that this 1973 game is no longer manufactured. Hard to imagine it being very popular in today's economy. But if you still want a set, so you can pretend to be part of the 1%, check out the link to Amazon below.
More info here.
And here.
Subtext: our arcane, byzantine loan policies are as horrifying and deadly as this nausea-inducing hybrid nightmare creature we chose as our new mascot.
If you're like me, you have a small stack of
Sacagawea dollars sitting in a drawer somewhere in your house or apartment. Whenever I get one of the coins, I feel reluctant to spend it, even though I know it has no value as a collector's item. So slowly my stack of them has accumulated.
But if you do have any lying around, it's worth looking at them more closely, because some of them may be worth more than face value. Quite a bit more. Anywhere from $5000 to $25000 each, if they're a so-called
Cheerios Dollar.
In 2000, when the coin was introduced, 5500 of them were given away in boxes of Cheerios as a promotion. Turns out that these Cheerios Dollars were slightly different than all the other Sacagawea Dollars. The tail feathers of the eagle on the reverse side of the coin had more details than the normal coin, and this made them more valuable. However, most of these Cheeries Dollars disappeared into circulation, and only around 70 of them have ever been found.
I've never had the luck to come across a Cheerios Dollar, and I probably never will. But whenever I get a Sacagawea Dollar, I always check it, just to make sure.
The Cheerios Dollar (top) has enhanced tail feathers when
compared with a normal Sacagawea Dollar (bottom)
According to
Wikipedia, this wasn't the very first ATM, but it was among the earlier, prototype models. I like how the caption presciently refers to the machines as "future monsters." Google news link:
Saskatoon Star Phoenix, October 31, 1966.
I'm young enough that I can't remember the first time I used an ATM machine. Their presence was something I always took for granted. But people 50 or older probably remember when these machines started to appear in the 70s.
Better quality picture:
What was once normal and not-weird becomes weird with the simple addition of that magical ingredient, "time."
Imagine an era when NYC had "tens of thousands" of payphones!
The other two segments of this video are less strange, but still worth watching.
Category: Art, Money