The History of the Man-Made Invention of Money

The History of the Man-Made Invention of Money Money is anything that is commonly accepted by a group of people for the exchange of goods, services, or resources. Every country has its own exchange system of coins and paper money. Bartering and Commodity Money In the beginning, people bartered. Bartering is the exchange of a good or service for another good or service. For example, a bag of rice for a bag of beans. However, what if you couldnt agree what something was worth in exchange or you didnt want what the other person had?  To solve that problem, humans developed what is called commodity money. A commodity is a basic item used by almost everyone. In the past, items such as salt, tea, tobacco, cattle, and seeds were commodities and therefore were once used as money. However, using commodities as money had other problems. Carrying bags of salt and other commodities was hard and commodities were difficult to store or were perishable. Coins and Paper Money Metals objects were introduced as money around 5000 B.C. By 700 BC, the Lydians became the first in the western world to make coins. Countries were soon minting their own series of coins with specific values. Metal was used because it was readily available, easy to work with and could be recycled. Since coins were given a certain value, it became easier to compare the cost of items people wanted. Some of the earliest known paper money dates back to ancient China, where the issuing  of paper money became common from about AD 960 onwards. Representative Money With the introduction of paper currency and non-precious coinage, commodity money evolved into representative money. This meant that what money itself was made of no longer had to be very valuable. Representative money was backed by a government or banks promise to exchange it for a certain amount of silver or gold. For example, the old British Pound bill or Pound Sterling was once guaranteed to be redeemable for a pound of sterling silver. For most of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the majority of currencies were based on representative money through the use of the gold standard. Fiat Money Representative money has now been replaced by fiat money. Fiat is the Latin word for let it be done. Money is now given value by a government fiat or decree.  In other words, enforceable legal tender laws were made. By law, the refusal of legal tender money in favor of some other form of payment is illegal. Origin of the Dollar Sign ($) The origin of the $ money sign is not certain. Many historians trace the $ money sign to either the Mexican or Spanish Ps for pesos, or piastres, or pieces of eight. The study of old manuscripts shows that the S gradually came to be written over the P and looking very much like the $ mark. U.S. Money Trivia On March 10, 1862, the first United States paper money was issued. The denominations at the time were $5, $10, and $20. They became legal tender by Act of March 17, 1862. The inclusion of In God We Trust on all currency was required by law in 1955. The national motto first appeared on paper money in 1957 on $1 Silver Certificates and on all Federal Reserve Notes beginning with Series 1963. Electronic Banking ERMA began as a project for the Bank of America in an effort to computerize the banking industry. MICR (magnetic ink character recognition) was part of ERMA. MICR allowed computers to read special numbers at the bottom of checks that allowed computerized tracking and accounting of check transactions.

Average ACT Score for Colleges What You Need to Get In

Average ACT Score for Colleges What You Need to Get In SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips If you're preparing for the ACT or you've taken the ACT, you probably want to know what score you need to get into college. What's an average ACT score for colleges? Do you need to do better than average to go to college? In this article, I'll explain average ACT scores and what they mean for you. Find out how to calculate the score you need to give yourself the best chance to get into your dream school. What Is the Average ACT Score for Colleges? The national average ACT scores stay roughly the same from year to year. Generally, the average is released for high school seniors each year. For the class of 2015, these were the average section and composite scores: Composite: 21.0 English: 20.4 Reading: 21.4 Math: 20.8 Science: 20.9 Because these averages are for all high school seniors who took the test and not for college-bound seniors, these scores may not be incredibly helpful for you. Some states require all students, even those who don't plan to attend college, to take the ACT. However, when you apply to college, you're being compared against other applicants, not against all high school seniors. How to Find the Average ACT Score of a Specific College While you may want to know how your ACT score stacks up against others who take the test, what really matters is how your score compares to other applicants of the colleges you apply to. Even though a 29 is well above the national average, a 29 is significantly below the average ACT for Ivy League schools. Therefore, even though a 29 is a very good score, you’ll be at a competitive disadvantage if you apply to any Ivy League school with a 29. On the other hand, if you apply to Cal States, a 29 will exceed the average of any California State University campus, and you’ll improve your chances of getting accepted if you that's your composite score. You can find the average ACT scores of different colleges in the PrepScholar database by googling â€Å"prepscholar (name of school) ACT† to find a school’s profile. On the school profile, you can see its average GPA, average ACT score, and acceptance rate. For example, according to the PrepScholar database, the average ACT score forBerkeley is a 30. Also, Berkeley's average GPA is a 3.86 and its acceptance rate is 18%. The University of Oklahoma has an average ACT score of 26, an average GPA of 3.59, and an acceptance rate of 80%. What Does the Average ACT Score of a College Mean to You? If you want to get into a certain school, your ACT score should be comparable to the average score for the college’s admits. To give yourself the best chance of gaining admission to a specific school, we recommend that your goal should be to get at least a 75th percentile score for that college. The 75th percentile score for Berkeley is a 33; therefore, if you want to go to Berkeley, your target score should be a 33. Because Berkeley's acceptance rate is only around 18%, you should try to surpass its average score to have a decent shot of gaining admission. Similiarly, the 75th percentile score for Oklahoma is a 29. If you dream of becoming a Sooner, you should shoot for a 29 on your ACT. Furthermore, because a certain number of spots will go to athletes, legacies, and children of big-time donors, your qualifications may have to be better than average if you aren’t in one of these categories. What If You Don’t Get Your Target Score? If you don’t get the 75th percentile score or even the average ACT score for a specific college, that doesn’t necessarily mean that you have no chance of getting accepted. However, if you still have time to reach your target score, it’s probably in your best interest tostudy and attempt toimprove your score. You can compensate for lower test scores with a higher GPA. Generally, schools place a greater emphasis on your transcript than on your standardized test scores. Also, on each school’s profile in the PrepScholar database, you can use our admissions calculator by entering your GPA and ACT score to get an estimate of your chances of gaining admission to that school. Furthermore, keep in mind that colleges tend to use holistic admissions, meaning that everything is considered when colleges determine whom to admit. They’ll evaluate your transcript, test scores, extracurricular activities, recommendations, application essays, and any other factors that admissions officers deem relevant. If you've faced any significant obstacles or you're from an impoverished background, colleges will also take this into account. Just because you don’t reach your target score doesn’t necessarily mean that you have no chance to get admitted. However, while most colleges don't claim to have a minimum ACT score, if your score isn't close to the average score for a particular school, you may have virtually no chance of getting accepted. Even if you have great grades and stellar extracurricular accomplishments, you probably don't have a realistic shot of getting into Princeton if your ACT score is lower than 20. While standardized tests aren't the only determining factor in college admissions, most colleges use the ACT to ensure that you're capable of succeeding academically. Your ACT score matters! What's Next? Now that you know more about average ACT scores, learn more about the scores you need to get into the Ivy League and top colleges. If you've already taken the ACT, find out if you should retake the test. Finally, not only do we have information about the average ACT scores for colleges, but also we've given you the average ACT scores by state. Want to improve your ACT score by 4+ points? Download our free guide to the top 5 strategies you need in your prep to improve your ACT score dramatically.