THE SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK
People I came across over the weekend and early this week seemed to be treating the issue of new money much in the way they treat major inclemencies of the weather, sporting defeats, bad war news, and like disastrous acts of God. People were united in putting forward a brave front, tackling it like the blitz, grinning and bearing it, glad to have been afforded in these curious new bits of money a common and enthralling topic of conversation. The general view was that it all represented a further step towards Monopoly money. Of course everybody will get used to it soon enough; but clearly also the effect in the new copper range of prices (and therefore eventually in all the upper ranges, too) cannot be other than in- flationary. I had not earlier given the matter any thought; but now, observing it begin to work, I see clearly that the whole necessary operation should have been on a new pound basis rather than on a new penny one-100 np should have been made to equal ten old shillings or one new half-price f.
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