The Culture of Cash
What has money meant in American society? On this episode of Now & Then, “The Culture of Cash,” Heather Cox Richardson and Joanne Freeman look at the culture of American currency & capital. They examine attempts in the early republic to create a viable national coinage system, the introduction of greenbacks during the Civil War, the success of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s 1933 bank holiday, and the songs and films that defined national conversations about money in the 20th century. How do systems of exchange reflect national values? How can different currencies highlight or spur political change? And how can past money debates help to contextualize the current battles over Bitcoin and cryptocurrency?
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Loved this! I have a disorder call Dyscalculia, which makes it extremely difficult to understand numbers. It wasn’t until I discovered economic theory that I realized I wasn’t intellectually inferior. Reading about theories of money (especially Modern Monetary Theory) was like reading the most thrilling spy novel. I think a great deal about the ways money has influenced culture. I did my graduate work at CalArts many years ago. In my time there, the goal was to be a great artist. Cut to the mid aughts and a conversation I had with then current CalArts students – their goal was to become millionaires before reaching thirty years old. I was flabbergasted. How had this happened? I started searching for answers. Someone you would both love, I think, is Robert Hockett, a professor of economics at Cornell. He anchors everything in history. If you don’t know his work, here’s a fantastic video introduction to Robert. Thanks so much for this podcast. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qdR4ujneQzo
That was very interesting. Thank you! Now the O'Jays song For The Love of Money is stuck in my head. Too bad, yet so ironic, Trump used it as the theme for The Apprentice. So glad his face is not on money as much as he'd want that along with his mug on Mt. Rushmore!