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Comment by notyourwork | Hacker News Reader

I find that really strange because yesterday I literally walked out of my bank with 50 brand new $2 bills.

For some people, time is money. So the convenience of avoiding a bank branch visit is worth paying a little more for the bills.

What do people do with them? Store them in mint condition in hope of creating collectors items in the future?

Give them to friends and kids, see them smile.

Also good for tipping.

Back when $2 used to be a good tip, but now? Do you fork over 5 of them?

Yes, you would use more than one $2-bill to tip them $10.

My dad takes clients out to lunch a few times a week. He always tips the server with $2 bills. Every server on his side of town remembers him, and his favorite drinks, meals, etc. (and really impresses the clients!)

When I used to work as a valet it was a big deal every time we got a $2 bill in tip. When we were splitting the tip we would always ask if any of the new guys had never gotten one before and make sure they got one.

There was a factory in a town somewhere that paid all its workers' bonuses in $2 bills so that the town could see the effect that the factory had on the local economy.

I love Woz's trick of having uncut sheets perforated and tearing them off for tips.

My recollection of the story is that he would laminate them into "tablets" with rubber cement and then tear off the top sheet(s) to make a payment. I think I have that story bookmarked somewhere.

EDIT: I'm not sure where the "printing" part of this story comes into play but it looks like his tablets do indeed have multiple bills per sheet in addition to being laminated at the top. (https://hackaday.com/2012/08/03/woz-prints-and-spend-his-own...)

You can buy uncut sheets of bills directly from the US mint. I got a sheet of 12x $1 bills when I visited DC as a child.

See here: https://www.moneyfactorystore.gov/1currencysheets.aspx

Right ... but I suspect his local printer was involved in turning them into a tablet of a given size rather than actually printing the bills.

Yep, he got a print shop to apply rubber cement and perforate the sheets.

Does anyone know how is that not illegal?

Even if they meet the required standards I thought only the government was allowed to print bills.

Does anyone have any links or references to what Woz is saying?

He's pulling the host's leg; the "high quality print shop" he buys them from is the Bureau of Printing and Engraving [1].

Of course, when you're interviewing a prankster about pranks, you've got to expect that sort of thing :)

[1] http://archive.woz.org/letters/general/78.html

Aha!

That makes perfect sense. And of course I fell for it...

Thanks!

My son is in kindergarten and one of his Vietnamese classmates gave everyone a red envelope with a $2 in it for Lunar New Year. I have also received a similar gift from a Chinese co-worker, so maybe that's where some are going?

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