A penny saved
Tuesday, November 13th, 2007
First there was Scared Straight, designed to terrify juvenile delinquents into behaving. Now however we’re light years beyond using abject horror to make people straighten out their lives. No in todays touchy feely world where we must be kinder and gentler towards one another we use a much softer approach. Like exploding piggy banks.
What?
You heard me. I said exploding piggy banks.
TOKYO (AFP) - Greying Japan has a new weapon to scare people into saving for their retirement — an exploding piggy bank. The “Savings Bomb,” which goes on sale in Japan next week, “explodes” and scatters coins if users fail to save for a long time, toy manufacturer TOMY Co Ltd said Thursday.
The battery-powered toy — designed as a cartoon-style, ball-shaped black bomb with a skull and crossbones logo — lights up, makes a noise, shakes violently and scatters coins if it is not topped up for a long time. - Source and rest of the article.
Strangely enough according to another article I read while doing some research into this odd method of savings stated that:
January is a battlefield for Japan’s piggy bank market, because people often make saving money one of their New Year resolutions and because children like to put aside the cash gifts their family gives them on New Year’s Day. - Source and rest of the article.
I’m having trouble wrapping my mind around the idea of Japan’s piggy bank market become a battlefield even if only for the month of January. You’d think that some of the brightest and most industrious people in all history would have better things to do than turn their piggy bank market into a battlefield.
No one can ever question the innovation of the Japanese. What will they come up with next? Exploding cars? Oh wait, someone has already beaten them to that.