I was at my friend Kayvan’s house today in Oakland, California. His mother had arrived from Iran a few days ago. She showed us the new Iranian coins in circulation. I was shocked to see a 250-Rial coin that’s slightly smaller than a penny. I took a picture to share.
When I was 11-12 year old in the early 1970s, my weekly allowance was 30 tomans (300 rials, about 4 dollars back then). That was A LOT of money, especially for a kid. Ten rials bought an ice cold Coca Cola and a bag of chips. “You can’t buy anything with 250 rials,” Kayvan’s mother said.
My parents used to talk about how cheap things were during their childhood too. But the erosion of the rial since the revolution has been far worse than the international average. And now we hear news that the rial’s fall against the dollar has accelerated in recent months.
