Euro-Dollars
Speaking of things that don’t exist in Ireland, how much confidence should I have in American business people who insist on calling Euros Euro-Dollars?
How can one be involved in international trade and think that the American unit of currency is the universal name for all currencies? Yen-Dollars, Pound-Dollars, Lira-Dollars?
Maybe I should start calling U.S. dollars American-Euros?
This post is with apologies to business folk who are talking about actual Euro-Dollars, as in U.S. dollars held on deposit in European banks outside the domestic monetary system and the controls of the national monetary authorities. Those markets in US dollars long predate the existence of the Euro.
See Also:
• A Kansas City Phone Call to an Irish Bank
• Changing Euros to dollars in the American Midwest
• cairde : friends
Eolaí gan Fhéile:
I could understand Mr. & Mrs. J. Soap, on hearing the terms Australian-Dollars, Zimbabwean-Dollars, Singaporean-Dollars etc., conclude that the Euro should be termed Euro-Dollars, but business people! That is a whole different ballgame.
That said, on the day of the Euro’s introduction, I had great difficulty explaining to the local village idiot that a) there was no such thing as an Irish-Euro and b) even if there were, there would be no exchange rate difference between it, and say, a French-Euro.
Years later, and I am still fighting the other great Euro battle with him: That the plural of Euro is Euro and the plural of Cent is Cents.
I totally concur Primal. I don’t expect everybody to know every country’s currency - but business people, especially those in international business, I don’t know what to say.
Well okay, I do, and I just said it.