Paying by Touch

The U.S. dollar may soon shrink a little more. This time, we mean it literally.  A federal appeals court ruled today that the U.S. Treasury must modify the paper money it issues so that blind people can distinguish between the various denominations. Depending on strangers to give them the correct change leaves them vulnerable to theft and fraud. As a sighted person I must say this is a problem that never occurred to me, but I’m sure it is aggravating to those who are affected. Guide dogs are probably not much help in this regard.

It seems the U.S. is behind the curve in addressing this problem. The Canadian dollar has Braille dots on it. Japanese Yen have other differences that can be identified by touch. In fact, of 180 countries that issue paper money only the U.S. has bills that are the same size and (until recently) color for all denominations. This is hardly a new problem, which makes me wonder why the Treasury did not address it in the currency redesign that was rolled out over the last few years. Now they are being sent back to the drawing board.

The solution to this problem will be of keen interest to the makers of ATM and vending machines. Millions of devices may need to be replaced or modified to accept whatever new design emerges. More likely, we will see increased reliance on cashless transactions. Before you know it, the dollar may not just shrink — it could disappear altogether.