The Metric System - It's Time to Catch Up

1230 Words5 Pages
The Metric System - It’s Time to Catch Up As Americans and consumers, what do we use everyday of our lives? We use some kind of measurement, we actually use two systems of measurements. Two systems of measurements? Yes we are using a mixture of metric and customary units in American, which can be very confusing. It’s like if the metric system is seen, or heard or even mention, we act like it some type of foreign language, some evil that we don’t understand, and want to avoid. But, we are around it all the time when we grocery shop, we see drink bottles in liters, and buy hamburger by the pound, we’ll buy gas by the gallon, but we’ll get medications by the milligram. The Metric System of measurement in this country has been a very long slow process race. We have been in this metric race at a snail’s pace for over a two hundred years. According to the National Counsel of Teachers of Mathematics, beginning in the late 19th century, most all of the nations, including United States began converting to the metric system, today known as the International System of Units or SI. The metric system is easy to use, it’s easy to covert, and its more efficient to use in daily life. As you can see in this slide, currently, shows all of the world is officially using the metric system. Only us, the Americans in the United States, and 2 small countries, Burma, and Liberia. And that’s it, out of the whole world. What is wrong with this picture? We currently, use a system of measurements called the United States Customary System. The American colonists inherited this system derived from the British Imperial System. Even, Britain, today, is using the metric system, you’ll still find a little of Imperial terms in used, but they are officially on the metric system. Our own government realized that the conversion in the increasing competitiveness of other nations and the demands of global
Open Document