I just felt like weighing in on this debate.

Currency identification is probably not preventing the majority of blind
people from participating in life to any significant degree.  However,
that does not mean that we shouldn't work toward revamping our currency
system.  Every other country that I have visited uses money of differing
sizes and colors.  There is no reason why the U.S. couldn't do the same.

As far as it being too expensive to replace the current system, that is
rubbish.  As someone else has already pointed out, the life span of a bill
is pretty short.  There would be a couple of years where both types of
bills would be in circulation, but probably not even that long.  There
might be some incremental cost in producing new engraving plates but it
isn't like you are having to replace something that doesn't get replaced
every day already.  The government is printing money constantly.  they
would just shift to producing the new money instead of the old money.

Refitting vending machines would be more of a concern but certainly not
impossible.  I have no idea of what the life expectancy of a vending
machine might be.  If they are long lived machines then the refit would be
amortized over many years.  If these machines are short lived then they
would just be replaced as needed.

Just because we are trying to push along with altering our currency
doesn't mean that we can't also push ahead with many of the other issues
plaguing the blind community.

Over all, I personally think that having money of varying sizes and colors
would be a benefit to a much larger population than just the blind
community.  It is a good idea and I think that it is worth the effort.

What I would like to see is something like I saw when I was in Italy.  All
the boxes of medication had braille on the box.  I thought that was
absolutely fantastic!  The cost of putting braille on a box cutting die
amortized over the hundreds of thousands of boxes produced by that die
would be less than negligible.

Just my 42 cents.



--
Blue skies.
Dan Rossi
Carnegie Mellon University.
E-Mail: [log in to unmask]
Tel:    (412) 268-9081


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