Paper Money Not Fair to the Blind

In one of the more curious rulings to come from a federal judge, the government has been ordered to change our currency so that people with impaired vision can use it more easily:

WASHINGTON — By keeping all U.S. currency the same size and texture, the government has denied blind people meaningful access to money, a federal judge said Tuesday. (NOTE: Taxes are denying me meaningful access to money - who do I sue?)

U.S. District Judge James Robertson said the Treasury Department has violated the law, and he ordered the government to come up with ways for the blind to tell bills apart.

He said he wouldn't tell officials how to fix the problem, but he ordered them to begin working on it within 10 days. The American Council of the Blind has proposed several options, including printing bills of differing sizes, adding embossed dots or foil to the paper or using raised ink.

"Of the more than 180 countries that issue paper currency, only the United States prints bills that are identical in size and color in all their denominations," Robertson wrote. "More than 100 of the other issuers vary their bills in size according to denomination, and every other issuer includes at least some features that help the visually impaired."

Government attorneys argued that forcing the Treasury Department to change the size of the bills or add texture would make it harder to prevent counterfeiting. Robertson was not swayed.

Maybe we can give the seeing-impaired all those new clunky dollar coins the government is making. None of the rest of us will want to use them.