Gil to Dollar Equivalency?

Yes, yes, I know... Gil is an entirely fictional currency. And I'm not talking about how much Gil sellers are selling Gil for.

I got to wondering tonight, though, what the equivalency is. It seems that a lot of people in the NA servers seem to feel like 1 gil = 1 dollar, and I'm not sure that's right. Final Fantasy is a Japanese franchise, after all, and the Yen is roughly equivalent to a penny. But 100:1 seems too steep for the Gil; it would make commodities like armor way too inexpensive.

So... what are your thoughts on the exchange rate?

10:1 or 25:1

I've always assumed that 100 gil = 1 dollar, myself...? Not sure, and I'm not even really sure why I picked that, but it's what I've always used as shorthand in my head. 100 gil = $1, 1000 gil = $10, and so on.

That would only work though if gil was a decimal-based currency, which it's not (there's no sub-unit currency like cents). I think the yen-similarity is the best thing to go on and simply use the value of the yen and it's use in Japan as a comparison.

Also remember the value of currency has many differing causes, not the least the whole 'supply=demand' thing. Something is only worth as much as what someone else is willing to pay for it (which goes doubly for the player-driven Market Board, but we're only talking about in-lore value here).

I like the 10:1 and 25:1 proposals, but it's important to remember that low-level crafters are exceptionally common, among NPC populations as well, so armors and weapons are likely cheap due to availability.

Yeah, I think I've about settled on 10:1, myself. Let's look at the evidence:

A flask of orange juice, as used in the dye quest, costs 7 gil from various vendors. At 10:1, that's $0.70, which is inexpensive, but not unreasonably so. A bowl of lentils and chestnuts? 37 gil, or $3.70. I've paid more than that for a bowl of soup, but it's not horribly far out of the neighborhood.

An Ash shortbow from the vendors sells for 708 gil, or $70.80. Looking at Cabela's (a hunting and fishing supply store) I see they have a 48" wooden recurve bow for about $150. Allowing for the economies of scale which a society in which bows are a common tool instead of an exotic hobby, I think the $70 is not unreasonable.