“Daddy, why did you pay me with a Federal Reserve Note?”
My eight year-old son and I have a business arrangement. He takes out the trash and I pay him a dollar. A couple of weeks ago, he did his job (well, I do have to remind him that it’s trash day, but he eventually empties all the baskets in the house and hauls the containers to the curb), but upon searching my wallet, I discovered I didn’t have any one dollar bills to pay him with. So I had an idea–I could pay him with a copper Liberty Dollar until I got enough change.
Tail-side of the Tea-Party Dollar
Head-side of the Liberty Dollar Tea Party Dollar
I asked him if he wanted the Liberty Dollar coin instead and he got really excited, grabbing the coin from my hand and shouting, “All right!” My wife frowned at me and accused me of paying him with phony money. Like a Federal Reserve note or coin isn’t phony!
A week or so went by and he came up to me and asked me pointedly, “Dad, did you pay me with a phony coin? Mom says it’s not real.” I told him that, no, the coin is indeed real and it is worth something, that he should hang on to that coin. But in the end, he was frustrated because he was saving his money so he could buy a toy. So I traded him the coin with a $1 FRN (Federal Reserve Note).
Tonight I reminded him that part of doing the trash was to bring the cans back from the curb after the garbage men did their job. He ran out the door, then paused and said, “and you have to give me my dollar.” I nodded, then retrieved a bill and placed it on the table where he was building legos. When he returned and found the dollar, he came in with a perplexed look on his face, holding the bill and pointing to the printing on the face. “Daddy, why did you pay me with a Federal Reserve Note?” I had to explain to him that we have very little choice in this country since the government only allows us to use FRNs as money, and that no one would take the Tea Party dollar because they don’t think it’s worth anything. He paused to think about it. “I think it’s worth something.”
So in the end he has paper money, because he wants to go out and spend it to buy the toy he was saving up for. At some point, I plan to open an account for him at GoldMoney.com, so he can not only save his money but preserve the wealth at the same time. I’m doing my best trying to teach my kids what money actually is but it isn’t easy. In the meantime, at least he is aware of what an FRN actually is!
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