$50,000 For Halves & $2 Bills?

basebal21,

What I mean is, some people buy Mint sewn bags of halves, search them for errors or something special, then dump the rest at banks. Or at least, I've heard of people doing that. And another point I wanted to raise was, as long as they are minting the Kennedy half, it is a current denomination (I don't know why the "Franklin" Half is listed as a current circulating denomination on this forum, seeing as all Franklins were made in the silver coinage times, and would likely be snatched out of circulation right away by someone, and the same thing is almost true with Eisenhower dollars and getting close with Susan B. Anthony dollar Coins as well) unless they change the half to another person on it, but I don't see why people are pushing for a new face (such as Reagan) on the half. I find that part unnessasary. A new reverse, I could go for though.

And one other thing. If the Federal Reserve has a ten year supply for circulation, why should I stop trying to get halves into circulation? I mean, I have a better chance, as it stands, to get halves (and $2 bills) back into circulation than the even more practical $200, $500, and $1,000 bills, seeing as they actually no longer print $500 and $1,000 bills and have never printed a $200 bill for circulation. Just saying...

Foxwoods Man,

I've tried focusing my energy on getting rid of the $1 bill, redesigning the $2 bill (which is actually finally going to happen with the next currency redesign, so there's one victory) and advocated a $2 coin as well, but what I do is write to my Congress people and all they do is send back form letters, that I was told, doesn't mean a thing. The half has a better chance of circulating right now than the dollar coin. Plus, if newer machines can accept halves, but just do not have a large enough slot and as tube to accept them, there should still be hope for the half. I still have to get a hold of that vendor I was talking to a long while back, but have not had the chance.

As for $200, $500, and $1,000 bills, WHY do so many people here think that only the orgainized crime ring would use them? As I've said many times in the past, that issue did not seem to concern Europe when the Euro came out with 200 and 500 euro notes with the 500 euro note being worth close to $1,000 U.S. so, why can't the U.S. gave large denomination banknotes? I don't carry much money often either, but with the checks I get monthly, I could always get out a $500 bill, a $200 bil and a $10 bill (I get $710) instead of multiple $100s, $50s, $20s, $10, $5s, $2,s and $1s if I want to buy something like a new truck or car or a bunch of groceries or a tv, or an appliance or electronic or a boat or rv or even, a house, and most private sellers prefer cash, and they are not going to go out of their way to buy a machine for credit cards. Ain't gonna happen. (Well, maybe in the future. Hopefully after I'm dead, and I'm 32 years old now) I don't normally carry around $500 or $1,000 except around the holidays and when I want to by something large or expensive.

As for drug dealers, counterfeiters and money launderers and the likes, the government needs to give up on that one, and their best bet would be to legalize ALL illegal drugs so that they too, can make money off the profit of people selling those drugs, and less people would be killing each other over them. I will NOT take any kind of drug for pleasure, or that will mess up my body, but if other people want to, the more power to them. Let these junkies ruin their bodies if they're that dumb. And even if we got rid of all of our current coins and currency we have now, and reissued the Half Cent and just used only that lowly denomination, drug dealers would still find their ways around that one, too. So why fight such a futile battle? Let us good, honest, law abiding citizens have large denomination Federal Reserve notes for our own conveinience and pleasure.

n9jig,

Nothing is on the BEP website yet, about thr $2 bill redesign. But I have been told by not one, but three BEP officials, because, due to a court decission passed by the American Council of the Blind, ALL denominations, EXCEPT the $1 bill MUST be redesigned to features new high contrast and embossed numbers and their own color scheme (and possibly, Braille). This redesign, following the release of the new $100 bill for the NexGen series (but no time table has been set for the next redesign's release), known as the "Meaningful Access" redesign, will apply to the $100, $50, $20, $10, $5, and $2 Federal Reserve notes. I have emails directly from the BEP that state this, even though there are older articles on the BEP's website at http://www.moneyfactory.gov say "There are no plans to redesign the $1 and $2 notes" that applies only to the NexGen series. Check out the Meaningful Access page there and you will see that it states that the BEP must redesign EVENY denomination it is lawfully allowed to alter (and the $2 bill is one of those denominations, because there is no law stating that the $2 bill can not be redesigned) Also, its interesting to note that, next year in 2014 "should" be the time to start a new series of redesigned U.S. currency, seeing as, the colorized new $20 bill came out in 2003, and the new $100 bill is coming out this year. 2003-2013 = 10 years, and the government has stated that it will redesign the currency every 7-10 years or so, and the Series 2009 $2 bill print run was only printed to last until 2014, which makes me wonder, is the redesigned $2 bill going to be the first redesigned denomination of the Meaningful Access redesign to be released, to test the features on the most least important bill denomination in circulation? And are there already some redesigned $2 bills printed and stockpiled to come out in 2014. I guess we will just have to wait and see.

And,just because the U.S. and Canada doesn't use halves now, don't mean they can't start. As I said, this would cause some savings in vending and self checkout machine industries if they accepted and dispensed halves as needed. Once people were (and I know most people don't like this word or way, but) "forcefully" given halves through machines dispensing them (similar to post office stamp machines giving out dollar coins), halves would become common place again, and the savings to the machine operator is, less trips to empty the quarter tubes seeing as most arcade games and toy cranes are 50 cents, and inserting a half into the machine would take up less room than two quarters, so the vendor would not have to be called out to empty the quarter tube as often if they also had a half tube. Sure they should still accept quarters, and should also even be made to take small dollar coins, but, don't leave the half out, just because it suffered a slump in circulation for a few decades, and unlike the SBA dollar coin, when that coin was failing, they stopped minting it until they ran out of them in 1999, but with the half, they kept on minting them, even though they were failing, and they still mint them for collectors. Did they keep on minting Susan B. Anthony dollars for collectors after 1981? I don't think so. A6t least, not to my knowledge. So I think there is still hope for the half if the situation is approached the right way. Maybe if the $1 bill and the penny went, we could set up five coins and five bill slot cash register drawers 5c, 10c, 25c, 50c, and $1, for coins, and $2, $5, $10, $20, $50 with $100s going in a safe or under the till for bills. I have read some sites many years ago where people argued to get rid of some of our lower denomination coins, such as the penny and nickel, and make room for larger denomination coins such as the half and the dollar coin.

As for $200, $500, and $1,000 bills, I will once again post:

As for $200, $500, and $1,000 bills, WHY do so many people here think that only the orgainized crime ring would use them? As I've said many times in the past, that issue did not seem to concern Europe when the Euro came out with 200 and 500 euro notes with the 500 euro note being worth close to $1,000 U.S. so, why can't the U.S. gave large denomination banknotes? I don't carry much money often either, but with the checks I get monthly, I could always get out a $500 bill, a $200 bil and a $10 bill (I get $710) instead of multiple $100s, $50s, $20s, $10, $5s, $2,s and $1s if I want to buy something like a new truck or car or a bunch of groceries or a tv, or an appliance or electronic or a boat or rv or even, a house, and most private sellers prefer cash, and they are not going to go out of their way to buy a machine for credit cards. Ain't gonna happen. (Well, maybe in the future. Hopefully after I'm dead, and I'm 32 years old now) I don't normally carry around $500 or $1,000 except around the holidays and when I want to by something large or expensive.

And the only "plastic" I'll ever use for those large transactions, is if we go to "polymer" banknotes, which is another great thing Canada has done.

basebal21,

What do you mean "Banks already have larger bills available to them for money transfers."? Are you saying that, some banks have actually kept a few $500, $1,000, $5,000, $10,000 and $100,000 bills around for their own personal use? Because I believe I've heard rumors about this.

basebal21,

Yes, I know. The "100K" bill was actually never printed as a Federal Reserve note. It was always a Gold Certificate, and was not used among the general piblic, and was illegal for the general public to do so, however, I don't inderstand just why it was illegal for the private sector to both own and use all denominations of "Orangebacks"

The real large bills like the $100,000 were never intended for circulation, in the pre-electronic banking days they were used for transfers. Even then bills larger than $100 were almost never seen anyway by real people other than bankers.

I have read (but can't find the cite due to extreme laziness) that the $2 was also exempt from the accessibility rules in place for larger bills and would not be redesigned. Again, it would not make sense as it is not now and will never be used for real commerce.

n9jig,

If you are claiming that the $2 bill will not be redesigned for the "Meaningful Access" (next currecy) redesign, here are just two of the few emails I got from the BEP on the issue:

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Email number one:

I received confirmation that the $2 is included in the meaningful access redesign program. Thank you for your inquiry.

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Thank you for your inquiry. The reference to the $1 and $2 note not being redesigned is, in fact, referring to the current series of redesign, commonly called the "NexGen series". Inclusion of a raised tactile feature is planned for a future redesign of the $100, $50, $20, $10, $5 and $2 Federal Reserve notes. You are correct, BEP is not planning to add a tactile feature to the $1 note. A decision has not been made regarding the next denomination to be redesigned or when it will be issued. BEP is not waiting for this decision to be made, however. We are already exploring technologies and considering note designs. Significant testing will be required to ensure that the tactile feature solution can be smoothly accommodated into BEP's manufacturing process.

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I think I have a few more emails concerning the $2 bill redesign, and also, your source may be outdated, because, originally, the Treasury wasn't even going to redesign the $5 bill with the NexGen series, until they found that counterfeiters were bleaching non-colorized big head $5 bills and printing non-colorized big head $100 bills on the same paper because that $5 and that $100 had secuity features in very similar locations. They were also not going to originally redesign the $2 bill with the Meaningful Access redesign, but that plan as well, has obviosly changed, and I am guessing that the reason why, is the same reason I've argued for many years: that the $1 and $2 bills look too similar, and even though $2 bills do not circulate much, there are still crooked people out there that would tell a visually impaired person that they are spending a $1 bill, when in fact, they are spending a $2 bill, and would rip the person off. So, according to what I know, the $2 bill is getting a redesign, next time around.

basebal21,

The $2 bill does NOT have the security strip. I've had to tell many cashiers over the years that have held $2 bills up to the light that they don't contain the strip. I do however, hope that they include both, the strip and a watermark in the redesigned $2, so that counterfeiters can not bleach counterfeit a pre-Series 1990 $5-$100 bill on the genuine currency paper, which would evade the pen test, and the person would just say they got the new pre-1990 $100 bill out of "granny's mattress stash". But even though the $1 bill is not getting a redesign, I still think the $1 should have a security strip and watermark of its own as well, again, to deter bleach counterfeiting. This would be practical, only if the new old style $1 bills with the security features do not mess with dollar bill readers.