The piggy bank is back! An Ohio newspaper reports on a public library program designed to teach kids financial literacy; each child who participates gets his or her own piggy bank (blech factor: boys get blue ones, girls get pink ones). According to Reuters, these little kids are not alone: piggy bank sales are up. The economic downturn is, of course, driving renewed interest in the financial security only piggy banks can provide. The same Reuters piece reports that sales of safes are up as well, suggesting people are less confident in the security of banks. Getting kids interested in piggy banks is a way to teach principles of saving to the younger generation, whose primary experience with cash may be the magical experience of seeing it shoot out of an ATM machine and go into mommy's purse.
The piggy bank is back not only materially, but representationally as well. Arguably the piggy bank has always been a primary visual topos for messages about saving:
But with the rising economic crisis, the piggy bank increasingly is rendered broken and abused:
My favorite piggy bank of the economic crisis has to be the demonic piggy bank produced as part of a campaign in Finland to encourage Finns to spend, not save, during the economic crisis:
I don't read Finnish, but I'm pretty sure I don't have to. The juxtaposition of the Victorian wallpaper, wooden dresser and lace doiley with blood-dripping fangs, horns, and claws is - no pun intended - priceless. Would you put your money in that thing? Nah, I didn't think so. Now get outta here and go buy something.
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