Big news for your wallet: in 2030, it will look different. Fingers crossed that you will be richer too, but the news of the week is that women will be the face of some of your bills for the first time in more than a century (when Martha Washington appeared), and African-Americans will be for the first time in the nation’s history.
Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew proposed a makeover for American currency by replacing slaveholder Andrew Jackson on the $20 bill with Harriet Tubman, former slave and abolitionist, and adding women and civil rights leaders to the back of $5 and $10 bills. Out of popular support for a certain musical, Alexander Hamilton will continue to decorate the front of the $10 bill. This historic move gives an African-American woman prime placement on United States currency and finally makes a change on the whitewashed, static bills.
"Her [Harriet Tubman's] incredible story of courage and commitment to equality embody the ideals of democracy that our nation celebrates," Lew told reporters on a conference call on Wednesday. "We’ll continue to value her legacy by honoring her on our currency.”
Tubman, born into slavery in Maryland, escaped to Pennsylvania only to return back to rescue her family members. Other slaves asked Tubman for help, too, and so she took the risk traveling to the South during the night through secret routes on the Underground Railroad. When the Civil War began, Tubman even became a spy for the Union. Her life achievements and selflessness pose ideals that the U.S. celebrates, instead of Jackson's persecution of Native Americans.
The U.S. is becoming a truly multicultural, multiethnic, and multiracial country, which we should take pride in. However, Americans are now using debit and credit cards for even the smallest purchases. By 2030, paper money will be less relevant. But even if the government cuts back on bigger bills, $20, $10, and $5 bills will increase, and so women will always be present in the physical presentation of our economy, for as far as we can see.
Get to know the women on the flip side of the $10 bill:
Sojourner Truth, Lucretia Mott, Susan B. Anthony, Alice Paul, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Back of the $5 bill:
Eleanor Roosevelt, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and Marian Anderson
