[nfb-talk] Cash

[Mike Freeman]

Josh:

No, I don't think bills of different sizes and/or shapes would make it 
easier. In fact, I think it would be much more awkward as I wouldn't be able 
to manipulate bills of various denominations in my hand without risk of 
dropping some in that I would be preoccupied trying to handle the various 
sizes or shapes. Moreover, I think it would be quite awkward to carry around 
a template, trying to match each bill against it to determine its value. 
Talk about slow!

And it's easy to avoid the change problem: I *tell* the clerk which 
denominations to hand me and in what order. And I can honestly say that I 
have never encountered a cashier who deliberately short-changed me. In fact, 
what hapepns more often is that I tell them theyve given me too much! And 
the till must balance at the end of the day and I certainly know where I 
went and at what time so I can easily rectify the situation if things go 
awry.

The one time I ever had a problem with a transaction had nothing to do with 
cash -- I returned a two-meter HT to a Radio Shak because it hadn't been 
repaired properly and the store didn't show I had done it so accused me of 
trying to steal a radio when I demanded after several months that I be given 
a new radio. Turns out the management caught an assistant store manager who 
had taken the radio I had returned for his own use. One manager gone.

In other words, the increased independence one would supposedly get from 
differently-sized or shaped currency is, in my opinion, largely illusory. 
And the American public will never go for currencies with difffering 
shape -- to awkward to handle.

Mike

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Josh" <jkenn337 at gmail.com>
To: "NFB Talk Mailing List" <nfb-talk at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Wednesday, December 13, 2006 6:18 PM
Subject: Re: [nfb-talk] Cash


> But european countries already have their money in different sizes. I
> personally would like my dollars to be different sizes so I could tell 
> what
> they are. Don't you think it would be faster and more convenient if you 
> knew
> that a five was smaller than a ten? or that a five was shaped like a
> triangle and that a ten was shaped like a circle? It's a lot better than
> going up to the counter to pay for your groceries and asking, what bills 
> do
> i have in my hand? and then the person working there responds, you have a 
> 1,
> a 5, two tens, and a 20. ok, I'll put away the 20 and give you two fives.
> no, I'll give you the ten. ok, I put the two fives away. Now the person
> gives you back change and has to tell you what bills he/she is giving you.
> Now let's take a look at Europe. They don't have this problem because 
> their
> money is already different sizes. So europe is better as far as money is
> concerned.
>
> Josh
>
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Mike Freeman" <k7uij at panix.com>
> To: "NFB Talk Mailing List" <nfb-talk at nfbnet.org>
> Sent: Wednesday, December 13, 2006 9:05 PM
> Subject: Re: [nfb-talk] Cash
>
>
>> In a perfect world, you'd be absolutely correct. And, in fact, at one
>> time,
>> NFB's R&D Committee was, in fact, looking at the possibilities of
>> constructing a hardware device that would intercept video signals and
>> would
>> do all the interpretation. Unfortunately, this is the real world and not
>> the
>> perfect one and the R&D Committee found that AI software wasn't at the
>> point
>> that it could be introduced as firmware in a hardware gizmo. Hence, we
>> live
>> with screen-readers which, like it or not, *require* web pages to conform
>> to
>> some guidelines to present information intelligibly to us. You know this
>> already but I present it to set the stage for what I shall say next.
>>
>> In a perfect world, you'd be absolutely correct; there would be a
>> contradiction in philosophy between NFB's opposition to changes in the
>> currency for the sake of the blind and NFB's Target lawsuit. But again,
>> this
>> isn't a perfect world. So in addition to philosophical purity, some
>> pragmatic considerations come into play. NFB has judged that in the world
>> of
>> cyberspace wherein more and more marketplace transactions are taking
>> place,
>> it is becoming increasingly important that the blind have access to
>> commercial and financial websites since there is or may well soon be no
>> way
>> for the blind to participate in the cybereconomy without it. Hence, the
>> Target lawsuit.
>>
>> On the other hand, with respect to cash transactions, the blind handle
>> their
>> currency and have always done so with very little difficulty. So we of 
>> NFB
>> feel that the ACB lawsuit is asking the world to be modified in an area
>> which we feel doesn't need modification and is positing a problem that,
>> for
>> the most part, doesn't exist. Oh yes, theoretically, the blind could be
>> cheated. But, anecdotally, the instances of being bilked in the *real*
>> world
>> are few and far between and are, I suspect, no more prevalent than they
>> are
>> for the sighted public.
>>
>> I would not object were currency changes made that would benefit 
>> everyone.
>> But I believe that we, the blind, don't need currency changes to live our
>> lives and engage in commerce in society. The ACB lawsuit sends the
>> opposite
>> message -- that we live in constant fear of being short-changed and 
>> cannot
>> make everyday financial transactions. This is obviously false.
>>
>> Yes, I have a money identifier. But I think I've used it three times this
>> year and could have gotten along perfectly well without it. It certainly
>> makes me bristle at the "poor, defenseless blind person" image propounded
>> by
>> the lawsuit.
>>
>> Mike
>>
>> ----- Original Message ----- 
>> From: "John Heim" <jheim at math.wisc.edu>
>> To: <nfb-talk at nfbnet.org>
>> Sent: Wednesday, December 13, 2006 10:22 AM
>> Subject: [nfb-talk] Cash
>>
>>
>>> Can someone please explain an apparent contradiction in NFB policies to
>>> me?
>>>
>>> The NFB says that making the government change bills so that blind 
>>> people
>>> can tell them apart implies that "the blind are not capable of looking
>>> out
>>> for our own best interests and that the whole world must be modified for
>>> our
>>> protection."
>>>
>>> Doesn't the suit against Target do the same thing? Doesn't it imply that
>>> the
>>> worl must be modified for us? If the NFB is to be consistent, shouldn't
>>> they
>>> be working on a screen reader that will work with the Target site rather
>>> than trying to make Target change their site?
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> nfb-talk mailing list
>>> nfb-talk at nfbnet.org
>>> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/nfb-talk
>>>
>>
>>
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>
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