Unless the bill is crisp, new, and fresh off the press, I always find myself going into the deep depths of paranoia in my thoughts of where the bill has been, and with an overwhelming urge to wash my hands after touching it. From the time a bill goes into circulation, it finds itself with the chance of travel across all fifty states, and perhaps even beyond. It finds itself in wallets, banks, pockets, bras, shoes, cups on the street, and in between the couch cushions. The one dollar bill, especially, inspires fear in my heart, as my immediate thought tends to surround the possibility of the dollar having come from a stripper’s g string.

So, obviously, I took to Google to discover the answer to this mystery—and found I wasn’t the only one wondering. Unsure of what to put down, I chose the search terms “how many dollar bills stripper.” This pulled up results from the extremely veritable sources of Reddit, Yahoo Answers, and a site called “Holy Taco.” Unfortunately, the researchers behind the posts have not yet come to a consensus on a definitive answer. However, I know now that 3%, 45%, or even 98% of US dollar bills have been stuck in a stripper’s g-string. With such a small margin of error, I feel far more secure in the knowledge of where my dollar bill has been!

All jokes aside, our money really does travel in its short lifespan of eighteen to twenty two months. Take a moment to feel slightly cheated, because whether the bill is a Washington or a Benjamin, it costs our government only 4.2 cents to make. To replenish the bill supply from the bills that exit circulation, at least 16,650,000 one dollar bills are printed by our government daily for only 699,300 dollars. Seems to me like a bit more of that should make its home in my pocket . . . or at least in my FAFSA.

However, for the sake of investigative reporting, I took to WheresGeorge.com to take a look at where individual bills had managed to travel. The first thing I noticed was that most bills tended to stay in the same geographical area. It would go to different cities within the same state, and then to some surrounding states. When it managed to make its way across a large area, it was usually by going from bordering state to bordering state, so there weren’t too many journeys, for example, from Florida to Washington. Far too many times, I found that the bills were given as change, specifically from the mildly delicious grease pit known as McDonald’s. So, long story short. My one dollar bill may or may not have been in a stripper’s boot, g-string, or anything else. However, chances are that it has found itself in at least three different McDonald’s franchises.