
If cash gets damaged, this Treasury team will make sure it’s not a lost cause - wallflower
https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/if-your-cash-gets-damaged-this-treasury-team-will-make-sure-its-not-a-lost-cause/2020/02/13/609fd154-3c6b-11ea-8872-5df698785a4e_story.html
======
haste410
There is a great Planet Money episode that covers this:
[https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/06/30/535062249/epis...](https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/06/30/535062249/episode-781-the-
money-fixers)

------
damip
The Bretton Woods Agreement pegged the dollar to gold ($35 for an ounce of
gold). I understand that this can work if the central bank emits $35 for every
ounce of gold they store.

But how does that account for destroyed/damaged/lost dollar bills ? The loss
is very hard quantify and monitor, but needs to be compensated either through
re-printing of new dollars, or through the destruction of stored gold to
maintain the desired exchange rate.

Could someone with better knowledge than me explain how this works ?

~~~
burnte
> Could someone with better knowledge than me explain how this works ?

The short answer is it doesn't. We haven't been on the gold system for a long
time, and BW was a sham, no one really did what the agreement said, there
wasn't nearly enough gold to do so anyway. Breton Woods was a fictional
agreement, basically. But once Nixon stopped pretending, we've been purely a
floating currency like most others since.

------
eganist
I appreciate dearly that this team exists and wouldn't be surprised if their
specific techniques for uncovering mutilated cash can be used in other
scenarios e.g. criminal forensics, but I feel like this is one of those groups
that would be targeted for a government cost-cut in the not-too-distant
future.

> If you're still using cash, it's at your own risk. We no longer have a
> recovery service for paper money.

------
paulddraper
A. This the hard-core disaster recovery for cash. For mundane stuff (my bill
got ripped in half) you can go to a bank and they will give you new bills and
ship the damaged ones to the Treasury.

B. If you have a stomach for cheesy movies, _The Hurricane Heist_ (2018) is
about a fictional plot to steal $600M from a cash destruction facility. (Cash
that is too old/damaged to be in circulation, but is still legal tender.)

------
wyldfire
Someone should do the same thing for lost cryptocoins ;)

~~~
PopeDotNinja
Plot twist... Satoshi' Bitcoins were in cold storage, but got burned up in a
fire.

~~~
penagwin
I mean that is certainly possible, maybe unlikely (because of the amount you'd
assume they'd have backups), but possible.

------
jugg1es
CBS Sunday Morning (my favorite news show) had a segment about this too:
[https://www.cbs.com/shows/cbs-sunday-
morning/video/GZb3nlcVQ...](https://www.cbs.com/shows/cbs-sunday-
morning/video/GZb3nlcVQD7qUGIx9BqXoUoiiJzV2Wt4/how-the-government-handles-
your-mutilated-money/)

------
darkstar999
I'm surprised it's a free service. How long are they spending on these $100k+
cases?!

I guess an argument for it being free is to garner trust in the currency.

~~~
ekimekim
A lot of very old government services are like that, they hail from a time
before everything was expected to be "free market" and needed to turn a profit
to justify its existence.

~~~
solotronics
It's not really a free service we are all paying for it via government
spending.. which is loosely related to taxes.

------
penagwin
For those struggling because of the paywall you can try outline. It's a pretty
decent site that can bypass a lot of paywalls and is actually usable compared
to most news sites. Ad block doesn't work here as it only shows the first
paragraph.

[https://outline.com/crbq2m](https://outline.com/crbq2m)

Note to moderators, If the direct link isn't allowed please change it to just
outline.com

~~~
frandroid
You can also read WaPo by carefully timing a click on your browser's Reader
Mode icon when the article loads. (The icon disappears once it detects that
you're not a subscriber, so you need to snipe it)

------
kemiller
I wish we had a team that cared as much for our democracy.

~~~
tathougies
A solid monetary system is a prerequisite to democracy.

------
stopads
It's kind of hilarious that they still spend money on the PR team to push
these stories about how important and sanctimonious cash is while at the same
time printing billions of dollars every night and just transferring to any
bank or hedge fund that wants it in the overnight repo market.

A whole set of theatrics for the commoners who still use cash, meanwhile we
just press some buttons and poof a billion dollars appears out of thin air in
your account (if you're rich enough).

~~~
reaperducer
_commoners who still use cash_

You're right, it's much better to use payment methods that track my wants,
needs, desires, habits, location, companions, financial status, political and
religious preferences; and then weaponizes it against me. Stupid commoners and
their freedom.

~~~
wyattpeak
Whatever the merits of the parent comment, I think you're misinterpreting
their intent.

Their stance is that the average citizen is made to jump through hoops to get
their cash replaced, while major players are handed money freely. The
"commoners" appellation is sarcastic.

