What does cash go after it's burned a hole in your pocket?
Discovery Channel aims to answer that question and more in a new special debuting at 9 p.m. March 30. Specifically, The Secret Life of Money will look at the systems that design, produce, protect, distribute and manage America's money.
The hourlong special will examine the entire life cycle of money, from minting and printing to distribution to protecting its value in the world market to meeting the demands of our nation’s banks. Discovery also will go behind the scenes of places few people ever see, such as the Bureau of Engraving and Printing, where bills are born; the U.S. Mint, which turns giant coils of metal into the coins we use every day; the Secret Service, where the nation’s top counterfeit experts try to put an end to bogus bills; and Dunbar armored cars, whose rolling fortresses help make sure that flow of currency never stops despite the dangers involved.
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The program also features insight from NPR’s Planet Money team, author David Wolman and artist J.S.G. Boggs.
The Hollywood Reporter has an exclusive look at the special, which gives an inside look at one of the 12 regional federal reserve banks, which warehouse money for commercial banks who consider huge amounts of cash a "liability."
At the Philadelphia branch, vp cash services Michelle Scipione reveals that the bank maintains anywhere between $4 billion and $5 billion in cash on any given day.
"You get used to it," she says. "We always like to say, 'If you start looking at the sacks of money as if it's your mortgage payment or your car payment, you are not in the right job.'"
Secret Life of Money was exec produced Brian Dean for Discovery and Don Campbell and Peter Schnall for Partisan Pictures. Erica Sashin was the writer-director.
