Fascinating news reports today, all pulled down from the AFP wire, that there’s a shortage of rupee coins in India because people have worked out that the base metal that the coin is made of has a greater value than the unit of currency itself, so they’re melting rupees down to make razor blades.
Kolkata police have raided a foundry which has been turning the coins into ingots for export. Meanwhile, everyone’s looking around, literally, for any small change they can find.
A currency that’s so devalued that its material value is greater than its face value. How crazy is that?
