US Dollars No Longer Accepted at Indian Tourist Sites

[FourScore]

Staff
AP News

Jan 03, 2008 06:40 EST

No dollars, just rupees please.

In a sign of how the once mighty U.S. dollar has fallen, India's tourism minister said Thursday that U.S. dollars will no longer be accepted at the country's heritage tourist sites, like the famed Taj Mahal.

For years the dollar was worth about 50 rupees and tourists visiting most sites in India were charged either $5 or 250 rupees.

But with the dollar at a nine-year low against the rupee — falling 11 percent in 2007 alone and now hovering at around 39 rupees — that deal has become a losing proposition for the tourism industry.

The country's tourism minister said, though, that the decision was only in part a reaction to the currency's plunging value.

SNIP

The Taj Mahal, India's famed white marble monument to love, which had charged tourists $15 or 750 rupees, has been refusing to accept dollars since November.

The move makes visits pricier for American tourists, who now have to shell out nearly $20.

And it's likely to get worse...

http://www.rawstory.com/news/mochila/Dollars_no_good_at_Indian_tourist_s_01032008.html

[avaistheone1]

1. I bet the Indians still like all the jobs we have offshored to them though.

[atreides1]

4. "WE" Haven't done anything

Those jobs were sent overseas by the corporations and the politicians that they own, so if you're going to accuse someone make sure that your finger is pointed in the right direction!

[RB TexLa]

5. Let's guess you think they don't deserve those jobs? Why?

[Deja Q]

12. Two words:

Windows Vista?


(in seriousness, it's all about the money. In such a "flat" world, the wages doled to India makes their economy and people prosper. Wages we can't begin to live on here in America... How's that for a response to a response that was just as glib? And never mind other arguments; it's crass for India to spit on America, given the nation building we're doing for them.)


(No, that restaurant didn't spring up in America either...)

[RaleighNCDUer]

15. Refusing to accept dollars is not 'spitting on America'.

It's a sound economic decision meant to deal with a currency that is all but in free-fall. No responsible businessman would accept payment in a currency that will be worth less in two weeks than it was on the day he received it.

This has little to do with India, and everything to do with Bushco.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

19. Do you accept rupees at your place of business?

[Mend]

7. I just received an email offering to do the billing for my office in

India. I am a small potato but I guess I am supposed to fire my American secretary and outsource her work. They are going after the little jobs too. And, no, of course, I won't do it.

[Deja Q]

8. American corporations.

Well, they're called "American" when there's bad news.

When it's good news, it's "Multinational".

[redqueen]

11. Dunno why... "multinational" makes them sound worse IMO. (nt)

[redqueen]

10. I really don't think the poster meant everyone in the country.

Geez.

[pointblank]

37. We?

I suppose by "we" you mean the country...unfortunately, corporations with no social conscious are to blame for this and they have nothing to do with the government, or "we" the people...except for the fact that "we" the people somehow "elected" a ridiculous government into power that cares more about corporations than the people it is supposed to care about...


:rant: :)

[Double T]

2. Just want ONE candidate that understands economics...........

and isn't a sellout to the corrupt corporate criminal interests. The cover up of the REAL and failing American economy and its impending collapse needs to be desperately brought to the forefront.

[avaistheone1]

3. Probably won't happen until the economy totally fails---

The corporations are in control of the government, and we pretty much have state run media.

They have no interest in reporting this story until they have no choice but to do so.

[redqueen]

13. Why wouldn't they sell out?

Didn't Clinton predict that we'd see hard times before good times with the whole leveling the playing field thing? This is all expected... they're still getting paid, getting lots of vacation time & getting good healthcare coverage in DC, so why should they care how impacts those beneath them?

[MH1]

14. It's too bad John Kerry isn't running this time, isn't it?

Check out his Export Products Not Jobs act and all the work he's done over the years for small businesses (especially for minority and women owned businesses).

His positions aren't as obvious as some might like but they do show an understanding of economics and how to make things better for those among us who aren't getting rich off corporate greed.

[Richard Steele]

6. Just another sign of the booming B*sh economy!

There was a time not long ago when US currency
was the most desirable in the world. You could go
almost anywhere, from Novosibersk to Rio de Janeiro
to some mud-hut village with a name no european has
ever successfully pronounced, and the people there would
gladly take your US dollars in payment for their goods
and/or services.

Do y'all have any idea how BAD things have to be
for people to STOP taking our money?

This isn't some minor setback, it's a fricking PARADIGM SHIFT.
The "US Empire" is entering its last throes. And just
about everyone knows it but us.

[MrScorpio]

9. Let's all thank George W. Bush, shall we, for keeping those greenbacks at home!

Thank you, George!

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

16. Is this really a good indicator?

I mean I know the dollar's going down the toilet, but I thought India was already a little weird about the rupee.

[Zywiec]

17. Who travels outside the country and expects to pay in dollars?

I was on a bus in Moscow and a guy gets on insisting he only has dollars. Hello - this is Russia and not the US. Go find an ATM.

What other currencies do we accept here regularly?

[RB TexLa]

18. People accepting the Peso is becoming more common, at least here it is.

[Zywiec]

23. Accepting Pesos? Where and for what services? n/t

[RB TexLa]

24. In Dallas, for whatever services people will accept them. Quite a few retail operations accept them

a couple of them have been in the national spotlight for it, I don't know how they chose which ones or why.

[zorahopkins]

21. Arrogant Americans

Honestly, about the only people I can think of who travel outside the US and expect to pay in US dollars are arrogant Americans.

Those kind of people who think everyone speaks English (if they don't, just YELL at them). They also stay in American hotels and demand American-style food.

[Boojatta]

27. "They also stay in American hotels and demand American-style food."

Is an American hotel not a place where one should expect to be able to order American-style food?

Maybe one should expect to be able to order American-style food in a Pakistani hotel. After all, Pakistan is the home of a KFC restaurant that was targeted by rioters when newspapers in Europe published cartoons that offended some Muslims.

[zorahopkins]

35. My Point IsThis

My point is this:

Arrogant americans (the sort who expect to pay with US dollars when travelling outside the US) are people who are so insulated that they do not want to experience the culture of a foreign country.

They expect India (or Pakistan or France or China or any other country) to be just like America.

Instead of staying at a local hotel, they stay in an American chain hotel.

Instead of going to a local restaurant with local cuisine, they prefer McDonalds and KFC or something equally American.

I often wonder why such people travel outside the US.

[ZombieNixon]

20. It makes sense. Why should you expect to use your own currency in someone else's country?

Except at a foreign exchange counter.

Of course, I was just in India, and was given the option to pay dollars to get into some places. My bet is it'll be a little while before this is actually nationally enforced.

[Mend]

22. in the good old days, they used to beg for US dollars in foreign countries...

the local currencies were questionable and the rate of exchange for dollars was great...you actually got more in the stores and on the street for dollars than at the bank. Our money was like gold once upon a time.

[RB TexLa]

26. You think the "good days" is where people beg for something from another country?

That's good in your opinion?

[Mend]

32. these weren't peasants begging on the street, these were prosperous store

owners who valued our money because our money was valuable and our economy was strong. I think you know exactly what I meant. Hope you have a good day.

[RB TexLa]

36. I know what you meant, you think things were better when it was so unequal that

they were begging for our currency. I think for a lot of DUers the concept of We over Me stops at the borders.

[Boojatta]

29. "Our money was like gold once upon a time."

Unless I am mistaken, Nixon not only got rid of the gold standard, but threatened all Americans who didn't want to sell their gold for greenbacks. Nixon wasn't Midas, but his administration could print lots of greenbacks.

[Boojatta]

28. Enforced by whom?

Allegedly, India is a "democracy."

[ZombieNixon]

30. Yeah, but no one cares enough to follow many of the laws.

Traffic laws are merely suggestions for example. :P

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

25. Well, I had to pay in pounds when I was in England.

And, yen when I was in Japan.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

31. About twenty years ago, I was at Narita Airport waiting to board a flight home

when the Chicago Board of Aldermen showed up in the same area and tried to pay in dollars at the snack bar. They were genuinely puzzled when the counter attendant refused to accept their greenbacks.

At the time it was actually illegal to use any currency except yen in Japan, so I explained this to the nearest Alderman.

He got this dazed look on his face and said, "But this is the airport."

And I asked, "Could someone use yen to buy a Coke at O'Hare?"

He finally got it.

Typically, it was only Communist countries that allowed tourists to pay in their home currency, and then only at so-called "dollar stores." Even when I went to China in 1990, we had to exchange our dollars for a special currency called Foreign Exchange Certificates, or FECs. The trouble was that 1) ordinary Chinese people had to look them over and actually read the inscriptions on them before they'd accept them, and 2) we always got our change in renminbi anyway.

I understand that FECs have since been abolished.

[otherlander]

33. Oh, *those* Indians.

I was worried there for a second.

[Bucky]

34. Ha. Yes, you can still hit the casinos this weekend.