Majority of Readers Favor Replacing Jackson With A Woman on Future $20 Bills
The Sunday Poll was about who should be on future $20 bills — Andrew Jackson or one of four women from our history. It was easy to predict the single answer with the most votes would be Andrew Jackson.
Q: Who should be on future $20 bills?
- Andrew Jackson — former President 11 [29.73%]
- Rosa Parks — civil rights activist 8 [21.62%]
- Harriet Tubman — abolitionist, underground railroad 7 [18.92%]
- TIE 4 [10.81%]
- Wilma Mankiller — 1st female Native American Tribe chief
- Eleanor Roosevelt — former first lady
- Unsure/No Answer 3 [8.11%]
But we can look at these numbers another way:
- Change 23 [62.16%]
- Don’t change 11 [29.73%]
- Unsure/No Answer 3 [8.11%]
A majority picked an answer that involves changing the $20 from Andrew Jackson to a woman. Be sure to vote for which of the four finalists you’d like to see on a $20 by 2020 — vote here.
— Steve Patterson
This is a classic case of selective application of the results. A significant plurality (of a small number of voters) voted for Jackson, a man, yet the headline screams “Majority . . . Favors . . . A Woman” (any woman)! There was no majority, no one person received more than 50%. What you need now is a runoff, between Jackson and Parks, to determine a true majority “winner”.
Had I set up the poll to be Jackson vs one of the four finalists I’m now confident a majority would’ve picked a woman over Jackson.
If the question you wanted answered was “Should a picture of a woman replace the picture of Andrew Jackson on the $20 bill?”, then ask that question, yes, no or maybe/not sure. If the question you wanted answered was “Which woman should replace Andrew Jackson on the $20 bill?”, then ask that question. What frustrates readers, like me, is when you try to put words in our mouths, in an apparent effort to support a position that you want to take.
Personally, I really don’t care whose picture is on my money, as long as it spends. Where I have an issue is change just for the sake of change – if it ain’t broke, don’t (waste resources to) fix it! If the $20 bill is going to be redesigned to make it more secure, as was done recently with the $100 bill, then sure, open up our choices. But if the only goal is to switch faces, for PC reasons, we have far more important things to spend our resources on (like addressing the pay gap between male and female workers)!
Agreed. Another classic case where an unscientific, biased poll is established to push a predetermined agenda.
Besides, women on currency hasn’t exactly worked out well over the years, has it?
Women haven’t been represented on our paper currency except: “Martha Washington’s portrait appeared on the face of an oversized $1 Silver Certificate in 1886 and 1891. She and husband George appeared on the reverse of the 1896 note.”
See http://www.womenon20s.org/why_the_20
The only question that remains, will Tubman make a “corrupt bargain” so she can be on the backside of the 20?
Just stop putting faces on the bill. Put freaking trees or amber waves of grain or something. Then again, that will no doubt become political as well.