New at Reason

July 20, 2007

Katherine Mangu-Ward defends the maligned peso.

Comments

|7.20.07 @ 12:54PM|#

As a selfemployed barber for 25 years I get tired of people telling others how to run their buisness.This is a case of a willing seller and willing buyer.Believe it most do things to make profit,not political points.By the way,I have been know to accept fine cigars and wines for payment.

|7.20.07 @ 1:07PM|#

It's a little misleading to call the Spanish milled dollar, also known as a "piece of eight", and once a pan-american currency, a "peso". The U.S. congress repealed the law making the Spanish milled dollar legal tender in 1857 while the Mexican peso didn't appear until 1864.

A history of Mexican currency

Wikipedia on the Spanish milled dollar

ed|7.20.07 @ 1:10PM|#

Michael,

The first US coins had the motto: Mind Your Business
I'll take that over In God We Trust any day.

http://www.coin-newbies.com/articles/mind.html

|7.20.07 @ 1:10PM|#

I can see why they're upset about this. This means that more businesses understand that Mexicans and their money are here to stay. Pizza Patron will now be joining the anti-anti-immigrant side.

What the anti-immigrant people are really bemoaning is another loss of a slice of public opinion.

|7.20.07 @ 1:24PM|#

Ed If only they would.

LarryA|7.20.07 @ 1:26PM|#

Nonetheless, many Americans (read: Fox News) went nuts last week when Value Giant announced that it would start accepting pesos in all of its stores on Saturday, July 14, fearing an increase in peso-spending illegal immigrants to the United States.

Where to start?
1. The illegal workers are being paid in dollars, and presumably that's what they would spend. If they had enough pesos to worry about, they wouldn't need to come pick our crops.
2. One of the main gripes of the anti-illegals is that illegals send all their pay home and don't contribute to our economy. Now they bitch when the illegals buy stuff.
3. Mexicans who legally make shopping trips north are a major positive factor in the U.S. border economy. I would suspect they'd be more likely to spend pesos, and much more likely to spend lots of pesos, than impoverished illegals who gave everything they had to their coyote.

|7.20.07 @ 1:28PM|#

The greatest threat to the republic, is hoards of Mexicans streaming across the border to work here and get paid in dollars... No wait, the greatest threat is hoards of Americans streaming across the border to hire Mexicans they can pay in Pesos to build things they can sell here for dollars... No no wait THIS is it; The greatest threat to all the American way of life is - Hoards of Mexicans working in Mexico for pesos, streaming across the border and spending their pesos here until we ship them back to Mexico before we have to pay them in dollars to work here... Yeah yeah that's it.

Russ 2000|7.20.07 @ 1:32PM|#

You should see the confused looks I get when I try to spend actual American currency - a Susan B Anthony dollar, or a Sacagawea dollar, or the new presidential dollar coins, or heck, even a fifty cent piece.

|7.20.07 @ 1:33PM|#

Adam Smith is rolling in the grave.

Reportero|7.20.07 @ 1:37PM|#

I live in Mexico and unfortunately get paid in U.S. dollars. With the sorry state of the greenback, I'd much rather receive pesos.

ed|7.20.07 @ 1:37PM|#

I was handed a pristine 1899 Indian-head penny with my change at a Taco stand in Tampa. The girl behind the counter was, yes, a Latina. Moral of the story: there is none, really.

|7.20.07 @ 1:44PM|#

Outside of the paranoia over "illegals" coming to the US from Mexico, I don't understand what the big deal is for exchanging one currency for another.
For example, if you are a US citizen who brings dollars to the Canadian border towns like Niagara Falls, you still get charged the exhange rate plus a premium for using US dollars vs. Canadian dollars. It's just the cost of doing business.
The rest of this distraction is just more fuel for the "Close the border" shills.

x,y|7.20.07 @ 1:44PM|#

So Pizza Patron doesn't put tequila on its pies?

|7.20.07 @ 2:16PM|#

Have the Fox News people spoken to any residents of Blaine, Washington about the menace of frostbacks spending Northern Pesos in their stores?

VM|7.20.07 @ 2:19PM|#

Aresen - no, but the citizens of Blaine, MO put on one helluva play, "Red, White, and Blaine"

|7.20.07 @ 2:31PM|#

Best Katie M-W piece ever! (Yes, I am drunk, but I'd say so even if I were sober!)

Rhywun|7.20.07 @ 2:53PM|#

I lived in Buffalo for eight years and worked various retail jobs--we accepted Canadian money at all of them.

Yes, I am drunk

I hate you.

|7.20.07 @ 2:54PM|#

I wonder how Lu Dobbs pays for his pizza?

Rhywun|7.20.07 @ 2:58PM|#

Arggggh! The comments at Malkin's site make my head hurt. My own damn fault for clicking on it.

T|7.20.07 @ 3:15PM|#

Warren,

You shouldn't hoard Mexicans. You're hurting the economy. You should spend your Mexicans freely to keep the mighty engines of commerce turning.

|7.20.07 @ 4:06PM|#

If illegals have no pesos, then who are these businesses targeting?

|7.20.07 @ 4:49PM|#

I wonder if they'd take Italian lira? I found some in my drawer the other day--a remnant from a long-ago European trip. Since I couldn't actually spend them in Italy anymore, it'd sure be nice if I could offload them somewhere...

|7.20.07 @ 5:08PM|#

Chris O

I can top that. I've got a 10,000 Mark banknote from the 1922 Weimar inflation.

thoreau|7.20.07 @ 5:15PM|#

First, it is obligatory for me to say that I agree with MikeP.

Second, for once, I actually liked a Katherine Mangu-Ward article. Well, I liked her Wikipedia article and some of her space travel stuff as well.

Third, somebody help me out here: Is the problem that immigrants are taking our jobs, that they're sending money south to their families, that they're bringing their families here, or that they're bringing their money here?

I just want to get it straight on what I should be upset about.

thoreau|7.20.07 @ 5:19PM|#

BTW, I wonder how much of this is about profiting from peso transactions, and how much of it is more of a marketing thing, a way of assuring immigrant customers that the business likes them and doesn't care where they're from.

Businesses do a lot of things for the simple purpose of keeping customers happy and profiting from the repeat business of happy customers. My wife works at a bookstore that will stay open past midnight tonight to sell Harry Potter at ridiculously low prices. They will also spend a bunch of money throwing a party for the kids. They expect to lose money tonight, but they want to keep customers happy.

(As to why they'll sell such a popular novel for barely any profit, when the DEMAND KURVE says otherwise, it's because the Harry Potter thing is so huge that just about every retailer is trying to get a piece of that action, and so the competition is insane. Even the technical bookstore at my research institute, basically a small room that only sells a few books required for various training programs and courses, is selling Harry Potter.)

|7.20.07 @ 5:46PM|#

I have a small stack of early 20th century 10 Peso coins (purchased in Vegas with the proceeds from whoopin' the sports books' ass one magic weekend back in '87) Made of gold, and weighing about 8 grams each, I doubt they'll ever be traded as Pesos again. As a historical note, the milled edges were pretty chewed up by coin shavers back in the olden days. I'm saving them for groceries in case the dollar ever gets treated like it's worth.

|7.20.07 @ 6:07PM|#

Third, somebody help me out here: Is the problem that immigrants are taking our jobs, that they're sending money south to their families, that they're bringing their families here, or that they're bringing their money here?

Oh great, another America Hater who Just Has To Have A Reason. Maybe we ought to just give in to the Wave, and let them Mooch Off Of Our Welfare System, Destroy Our Sovereignty, Kidnap Our Women, Burn Our Capital, and Use Our Flag As Their Toilet Paper.

Is that What You Want? Huh?

thoreau|7.20.07 @ 6:24PM|#

Maybe we ought to just give in to the Wave, and let them Mooch Off Of Our Welfare System, Destroy Our Sovereignty, Kidnap Our Women, Burn Our Capital, and Use Our Flag As Their Toilet Paper.

Could I still get cheap groceries?

|7.20.07 @ 6:41PM|#

Odd, LoneWacko doesn't have anything to say about any of this IllegalImmigration PesoSpending. Looks like he was napping on the job again.

|7.20.07 @ 7:08PM|#

I wonder how Lou Dobbs pays for his pizza?

In special new monetary units that are only available to white, Christian, American-born knownothing assholes. They're called "Tancredos"...

|7.20.07 @ 7:57PM|#

Tancredos sound like a kind of cereal...made of good American corn...which was domesticated by people living in modern-day Mexico...fuck, where am I going with this?

|7.20.07 @ 8:28PM|#

Two hundred twenty-two years and two weeks ago today, the United States made the peso its official currency.

You are over one hundred years too late for that argument. But if any of you want to go back to trading your greenbacks for pesos at a 1:1 ratio, let me know. I also have some oceanfront property in Nebraska you might be interested in.

There's no particular reason to think illegal immigrants are more likely to have pesos on hand than legal ones.

The recent illegal alien population from Mexico is vastly larger than the recent legal immigrant population from Mexico, so yes, there is reason to think these businesses target illegal aliens. Let us not kid ourselves.

"We have carved this niche in the pizza industry to compete and serve an underserved market-the Latino customer. Not to make any political statement."

In other words, recent illegal aliens.

"These stores" are in Dallas-the closest store is 422 miles from the border. It's unlikely that an illegal immigrant is going to decide to slip past the fence, push through a grueling trek across the desert, and then continue for another 420 miles, all because he heard he could find rest, succor, and a place to spend his pesos in Dallas.

And all the more reason to believe it is recent illegal aliens rather than legal Hispanic Americans living close to the border who are using the pesos.

The widespread adoption of the peso will only discourage the assimilation of Mexicans to American life. It's only one more indication of the development of a bicultural society.

Illegal immigrants can even open bank accounts with their pesos (and without a Social Security number) to get all the dollars they need.

That is another thing enemies of illegal immigration oppose.

In fact, border towns have long accepted foreign currencies in North America.

Yes, and there it would be understandable for obvious reasons. But Las Vegas is nowhere near the Mexican border.

The dollar symbol, according to most historical accounts, originally stood for "pesos" or otherwise found its way into our language via Spanish colonial currency.

Who cares?


I'm curious as to how many of you at Reason would just like to merge with Mexico? And how many of you believe we should just have a single world government allowing free trade and free movement of labor?

thoreau|7.20.07 @ 10:06PM|#

I'm curious as to how many of you at Reason would just like to merge with Mexico?

Depends on what they're offering. If they offer a lifetime of free enchiladas to everybody born in the US at the time of the deal, and free Salma Hayek movies on TV 24/7, I might contemplate a merger. Especially if they include oil privatization and Martian forests in the deal.

What would cinch the deal is chocolate. The Mexicans pioneered its use, making them one of the two greatest civilizations of all time. (The other great civilization being China, which gave us ice cream.)

And how many of you believe we should just have a single world government allowing free trade and free movement of labor?

If I thought that a world government would actually allow free exchange and movement of people, products, and information, I'd give that some serious thought.

|7.20.07 @ 10:26PM|#

"I'm curious as to how many of you at Reason would just like to merge with Mexico?"

I would -- if they became new additional states to our Union. No way if we have to accept their corrupt government. Just got back from a trip to Tijuana -- no one at all checking you going into Mexico, free to enter -- major traffic jam from the U.S. government screening everyone trying to enter. Talk about a country whose economy would take off with a change in governance to ours Screwed up as it is, we've got nothing like the misery inflicted on their hapless citizens.

|7.20.07 @ 10:59PM|#

No way if we have to accept their corrupt government.

After all, you've got your own corrupt government. ;P

Deus|7.20.07 @ 11:45PM|#

Just got back from a trip to Tijuana -- no one at all checking you going into Mexico, free to enter -- major traffic jam from the U.S. government screening everyone trying to enter. Talk about a country whose economy would take off with a change in governance to ours Screwed up as it is, we've got nothing like the misery inflicted on their hapless citizens.

The interesting thing about Baja California is that it is a stronghold of the reforming PRD. It was the first state to break the stronghold of Mexico's former ruling party, the PRI. So when you look at Tijuana, you're probably seeing the most vibrant economy in the entire country. (The things you learn from tour guides who have to kill some time...)

And to tie into this article: When I was there, all the stores on Revolucion Ave only accepted Greenbacks.

thoreau|7.21.07 @ 10:15AM|#

When I was there, all the stores on Revolucion Ave only accepted Greenbacks.

Right now, some Mexican is probably complaining that his sovereignty has been violated.

Brian Carnell|7.21.07 @ 10:59AM|#

The other day, I walked into a Subway here in Michigan and paid the immigrant Indian owner entirely in Canadian coin for my soft drink. Somebody probably should have gone to Gitmo for that transaction.

|7.21.07 @ 1:42PM|#

Merging with Mexico sounds every dumber than panicking about a pizza place letting their customers clean out their change jars as a marketing stunt.

|7.21.07 @ 4:29PM|#

The whole thing is good advertising for Pizza Patron; sales are up 34%, I think I'll try it the next time I'm in that area of the Country.

Maybe for the novelty of it, I will buy a 100 peso gift card to Pizza Patron for a latino friend next Christmas.....better still, send one to Ann Coulter.........

|7.21.07 @ 6:43PM|#

tommy: any real numbers to back up your claim the illegal immigration is "vastly larger" than legal immigration? And more importantly, is illegal immigration "vastly larger" than legal migration? Let's not kid ourselves, if the numbers were easily known, couldn't the illegal immigrants be tracked? I'm getting tired of anti-immigration people making up shit to win arguments. I'm an American citizen, and I have at least $20 in at least 6 foreign currencies. By your stupid argument, I must be illegal.

|7.21.07 @ 7:43PM|#

I consider myself a true conservative,before people like Michell Malkin gave it a bad mame .I like limited goverment,I leave people alone that leave me alone,and believe the constitution means what it says.I think the people of Mexico are fleeing oppresion,just as the chinese,cubans,vietnamese and my relatives the irish.It's been my experiance the new arivals cherish the freedom in this country more that those who grew up here.It's a cruel world out there.

thoreau|7.21.07 @ 8:52PM|#

joe-

Whether or nota merger with Mexico is a dumb idea depends on what sort of Salma Hayek-related concessions they're willing to make.

And chocolate-related concessions.

And enchiladas.

And, of course, Martian mountains.

Dale|7.21.07 @ 11:47PM|#

I believe that many Nevada casinos have been accepting several Foreign currencies for many years.

|7.22.07 @ 1:12AM|#

If they accept, who cares? They accept US dollars, too.

|7.22.07 @ 7:45AM|#

We should just annex Mexico and make it the 51st state. We could call it the gardener state.

|7.22.07 @ 7:50AM|#

"any real numbers to back up your claim the illegal immigration is "vastly larger" than legal immigration?"

Lamar, You got him with that one. It's all the legal migrants that have forced the closure of California's hospital emergency rooms, that should be obvious.

"And more importantly, is illegal immigration "vastly larger" than legal migration?"

huh?

|7.22.07 @ 7:55AM|#

Thoreau,

Do you actually like Selma Hayak movies? SH 24/7 would be sufficient to drive me insane.

thoreau|7.22.07 @ 10:32AM|#

Do you actually like Selma Hayak movies?

I need you to clarify this question. Do you want to know if I enjoy watching the movies with the volume on, or with the volume off?

VM|7.22.07 @ 10:49AM|#

"I also have some oceanfront property in Nebraska you might be interested in."

ah ha!
tommy is a shill for Big Melting Polar Ice Cap!

|7.22.07 @ 3:44PM|#

"And how many of you believe we should just have a single world government allowing free trade and free movement of labor?"

I do actually entertain thoughts of a Libertarian World Govrnment...which is almost an oxymoron isn't it. Shall I take the time to develop it here? (oddly it almost always involves an Emperor...just the megalomaniac in me ;) )

|7.22.07 @ 3:45PM|#

Oh yeah...another currency story:
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2007/07/transition_town_currency_ebay.php

bafana|7.23.07 @ 2:53AM|#

Amazing to read about such US provincialism. Before the Euro came, I often traveled to Belgium for a lunch and shopping session. When we paid our bills after eating, the waiter would usually arrive with a bunch of different wallets and ask which currency we would like to use. Belgium was not the only country to do that before the Euro. No problem at all. So why not accept Peso too?