This week the U.S. Treasury unveiled new $100 currency redesigned to discourage counterfeiting. If counterfeiters are deterred by ugliness, this should do the trick.
Okay, we understand the need to incorporate high-tech security features, but was it really necessary to make statesman Ben Franklin look like comedian Jack Benny? Who’s idea was it to stick the Liberty Bell in an orange inkwell and feature the back side of Independence Hall instead of the front? And why was Franklin dressed in a lavender jacket and shoved off-center so an offensive blue 3-D security ribbon could run down the middle? It seems like our most revered American symbols are being mocked.
Still… if anyone offered to give us a suitcase filled with ugly new $100s if we’d stop complaining about the bad design, we’d gladly accept.
It’s sad that, given the opportunity to redesign US currency, the folks behind the reissues of our bills are focusing solely on security, and merely shuffling around elements of the old currency design. Is this a reflection of budgetary constraints, or are the designers at the US Mint that fond of the old “look” that they can’t let it go? A conversation with the designers might be enlightening… None of the bills that have been “redesigned” are appealing visually.