This is not a pile of coins. When something is a dollars-and-cents matter, people are looking only at the money — cost, profit, what you can count. Feelings, beauty, and 'what we wish' sit outside. It is American English, mostly in newspapers and meetings, and it feels practical rather than warm. You will usually see it with hyphens before a noun: a dollars-and-cents question, a dollars-and-cents decision. Though actually, it does not have to be about US money; speakers use it for any hard look at cost, even in other countries.

金錢上的（不是字面上的「美元和美分」，而是只看實際收支）