How do you say "a pound was five dollars"?

• lo brityrupnu be li pa pu vamji lo merkyrupnu be li mu

We don't say "mu merkyrupnu" for "five dollars"; that means five
things (prices? costs?) which are a dollar each.

How do we do it instead? Uh, lo merkyrupnu be li mu?

No, that doesn't work either: that is one or more things which
are (cost?) five dollars each.

Loglan solves this problem by a conventional hack of using the
number 5d to mean five dollars. This is malylojbo.

The more general question is, how do you speak of measurements, abstracted from the thing being measured? The abstract notion of "5 m", as opposed to "that which is 5 m long"? Solve that, and you solve the abstract $5, as in "my bank balance is $5." For the physical currency, on the other hand, all you need is sicni be le merko befi li mu (sicni obviously being intended for banknotes as well as coins); and I don't think sicni befi mu meryru'u is unintelligible either. — nitcion. What's the second be for in sicni be le merko befi li mi? Is the fi li mi supposed to be attached to merko? pne Or is it supposed to be a bei instead? pne

le ka ritru'u li pa pu dunli le ka meryru'u li mu kei le ka ce'u vamji makau

Yeah, I was afraid the answer was ka. I certainly don't think it's ni; leni meryru'u li mu seems to be just silly. But does this work for "my bank balance is $5"? Or do I use vamji there too? — nitcion

?? meryru'u mumei? It requires a convention, but a relatively clear one, whose literal meaning is not going to be common.

• This is clearly not a general solution (if a solution at all), for "five feet", say, is not a set and even less so "five degrees" of temperature.