The Case of a Penny Found v. A Penny Earned: Part 2

Change is everywhere. (Thanks, Obama!) All you have to do is keep your eyes open. Pennies are a dime a dozen. Actually, they are 12 cents a dozen. There I go leaving out my two cents again. Nickel for every time that's happened. Quarter. But, you're probably asking me, "Charlie, what types of coins will I find most often on the ground?" I'm glad you asked. Pennies. Lots of pennies. Dimes are less frequent, but still popular. Nickels are rare. Not quarter rare, but rare nonetheless. Of course, it all depends on where you look.

Let's step back for a second. I said that I conducted an experiment. I'm now legally referred to as Science Charlie. I changed my birth certificate. Anyway, the experiment is this: How much money is on the ground of New York City at any one time, or at least everyday? What I did was keep track of how far I walked and how much money I found for 10 days. I can show you the entire chart, but that seems boring to me. Let me go over the averages. I averaged approximately three miles of walking and $0.21 per day. And Google says that New York City in 304.6 square miles in size. But how do I get my distance traveled to become square miles traveled? I assumed my field of vision, the amount of ground that I can accurately pay attention to, to be 10 feet in either direction, or 20 feet wide. The conversion becomes 0.00379 miles. So, 304.6 divided by (3 multiplied by 0.00379) multiplied by 0.21 equals............. approximately $5,600.

So, everyday, there is about $5,600 dollars on the ground of NYC. That's good money. I mean, honestly, it's my main source of income. You're telling me that on the ground of New York City, there is approximately two Hamilton tickets worth of money? Sign me up. That's a lot of Tubmans.

Now, back to where to look. I'm going to give you the low down on where to find money that's down low. Here's where to look: grocery stores, subways, post offices, malls, convenience stores, and Dunkin Donuts/Baskin Robbins/Subway stores. So now you know the secrets. But hey, this is my thing. Don't you dare ruin this for me. Seriously. 

All of this is to say that money is out there. Free money. It's broken up into tiny metal pieces, but it's there. Seriously, though, there is a large amount of money on the ground, just waiting to be picked up. It's not possible for one person to get it all, but like, say, 100 people could get a lot and then donate it to a charity, I think. Or maybe I could start my own charity? Anybody want to do that with me? Let me know. And I'm totally willing to look more into all of this. You just have to pay me first!