06-03-2023, 02:31 PM
By now one must be a coin collector to have knowledge of steel pennies. People hated them, and by 1944 the US mints were beginning to process spent shell casings into new copper cents. America needed lots of pennies for the civilian commerce of the time -- almost all of it was by cash or currency, and even with rationing there was much of it. Personal checks were for rich people by the standards of the time.
Despite inflation, America is printing no currency bigger than the $100 note. Cash transactions are becoming rarer at retailers because of ATM/debit cards well favored because they typically have direct deposit attached. Personal checks are almost entirely for mail transactions (you charged the bill or signed for the mortgage, or it is for a utility or taxes) or unusually-large transactions (as in real estate). The paycheck that one cashes on Friday for spending on Saturday is becoming an anachronism. SNAP comes on cards like this:
![[Image: shopping_14.jpg]](https://snaped.fns.usda.gov/sites/default/files/gallery/2018-04/shopping_14.jpg)
No currency ever needs change hands.
Tolling authorities are establishing non-cash tolling by what I call "electronic pick-pocket" in which people are obliged to put money onto a non-interest-bearing prepayment account for use when one drives through an array of transponders. Supposedly the collisions get reduced at toll booths, but it is a clever way for tolling authorities (especially entities deputized to collect the tolls) to get interest-free use of money and be able to raise tolls whenever desired.
Of course, much of the US currency in circulation is in a way toxic: it's drug money. My position on drugs is obvious enough about the blood money that buys the drugs for addicts and weapons for drug lords for civil wars against anyone not under their thumb. It would be best if that toxic money vanished.
Despite inflation, America is printing no currency bigger than the $100 note. Cash transactions are becoming rarer at retailers because of ATM/debit cards well favored because they typically have direct deposit attached. Personal checks are almost entirely for mail transactions (you charged the bill or signed for the mortgage, or it is for a utility or taxes) or unusually-large transactions (as in real estate). The paycheck that one cashes on Friday for spending on Saturday is becoming an anachronism. SNAP comes on cards like this:
No currency ever needs change hands.
Tolling authorities are establishing non-cash tolling by what I call "electronic pick-pocket" in which people are obliged to put money onto a non-interest-bearing prepayment account for use when one drives through an array of transponders. Supposedly the collisions get reduced at toll booths, but it is a clever way for tolling authorities (especially entities deputized to collect the tolls) to get interest-free use of money and be able to raise tolls whenever desired.
Of course, much of the US currency in circulation is in a way toxic: it's drug money. My position on drugs is obvious enough about the blood money that buys the drugs for addicts and weapons for drug lords for civil wars against anyone not under their thumb. It would be best if that toxic money vanished.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.