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Your two cents now worth more
- Thread starter Tanglewood
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I keep them and roll them to take to the bank.
But I'm squarely in the camp that wants to get rid of them altogether...I was even before it cost more to make them than they're worth.
But I'm squarely in the camp that wants to get rid of them altogether...I was even before it cost more to make them than they're worth.
What's with all the local stations airing penny stories today? We got the same thing this evening. So, expanding on the last comment in the article, do we kill the nickel too, since it costs 5.73 cents to make?
I'm firming in the keep the penny camp, and I would love to find the source of my local news's claim that killing the penny would cost consumers $600m per year (thus justifying keeping the penny).
I'm firming in the keep the penny camp, and I would love to find the source of my local news's claim that killing the penny would cost consumers $600m per year (thus justifying keeping the penny).
WildCowboy said:
I think they should too
If they still want to mint it they should do what they do for the half dollar and just mint the penny for the uncirrulated and proof sets only.
I personally just throw all my change into a big coffee mug that is now overflowing. I only pillage the mug to grab quarters for the vending machine at work.
Cnn.com had a story about this today as well. Attached to the story is an amusing video where the reporter tries to by a newspaper with 25 pennies. One stand turns her away, and at a second the guy tells her to take the paper for free. I had a good laugh, I'd never thought about pennies being a burden. I'll still pick up a penny on the ground but only if it is head up. 
Link to story and video:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/07/02/poor.penny.ap/index.html
Link to story and video:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/07/02/poor.penny.ap/index.html
Here in NZ the smallest denomination is 5 cents, and they're going to start phasing that out at the end of this month. Our smallest will then be 10 cents, which is currently worth about 6 US cents.
Tanglewood said:
Save them, roll them, and when I have business at the bank, I exchange them for gold dollar coins and/or $2 bills. Those I use mainly for tipping at restaurants or coffee money.
nbs2 said:
$600m. Wow.
I strongly believe that the smallest denomination of currency that we have should be the smallest denomination (or part thereof) that we should have to pay. Otherwise, it's just taking money from the consumers (me). And I know stores aren't gonna follow the rounding rules we're all used to (down at under 2.5c and up from 2.5 and above.)
For a second I was thinking, "Why would opinions be worth more today?"
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Keep them around, I for sure don't want to see companies pricing things so they can extract an extra 4.9 cents on every purchase.
Especially when they are already taking fractional cents away from you when they compute the taxes -- purchase is 1 dollar and .1 cents after tax, heck lets make them pay dollar 1.01 and give them 99 cents in change.
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Keep them around, I for sure don't want to see companies pricing things so they can extract an extra 4.9 cents on every purchase.
Especially when they are already taking fractional cents away from you when they compute the taxes -- purchase is 1 dollar and .1 cents after tax, heck lets make them pay dollar 1.01 and give them 99 cents in change.
Tanglewood said:Here's a picture of Edmond Knowles from the article and his $13,084.59 worth of pennies.
Wow, that is a lot of pennies!
Working at a financial institution, I would to have that guy bring all of those pennies to my window!
I keep my pennies in a container on my desk at work, sometimes when I get bored and I play with them. One time I tapped them all together, it was fun. stupid pennies. Australia/NZ have it right. Death to the penny
I like not having pennies, and I like the idea of just rounding to the nearest 5 cents.
They don't do many things well in Oz and NZ, but they handled their currency situation well. No pennies. Sweeeeet.
Going back to Canada the one time was a pain. I got like 8 pennies and I didn't know whether to keep them in my wallet's coin pouch, or just chuck them into the bin. Then I realized that we don't have bins in Canada. We have "garbage cans" and then really got confused.
They don't do many things well in Oz and NZ, but they handled their currency situation well. No pennies. Sweeeeet.
Going back to Canada the one time was a pain. I got like 8 pennies and I didn't know whether to keep them in my wallet's coin pouch, or just chuck them into the bin. Then I realized that we don't have bins in Canada. We have "garbage cans" and then really got confused.
That was the reasoning behind the 600m - the rounding up that stores would engage in would quickly add up. It's funny that it's only $2/person/year, but still more than half a billion....jdechko said:
I'm in the keep the penny camp. If we start rounding to the nearest 5c I forsee stores carefully calculating their prices so that after tax they work out to X + 2.51c so they can get that little extra profit margin. Plus, what happens if I pay with a credit card? There's no reason to round that to 5c, they can make it as exact as they want. I did some programming for a commodities company that kept their clients' account balances to the hundredth of a penny. It may seem trivial but after millions of transactions they can add up quickly, just think Office Space.
Death to pennies, but this reminds me that that coinstar company advertised free coin counting when the proceeds are put on a card for places like Starbucks. I have change lying around, and I spend money on Starbucks regularly enough that this is a win-win.
I hate pennies! I'll always just throw them out if I get them in change. Sometimes I'll throw out nickels too because they're worth so little and I'd rather not have the extra weight in my pockets.
Oh and while they're at it, why don't they stop doing gas prices with 9/10 of a cent. Freaking round it to the next penny.
We use the Swedish rounding system currently - where prices that come out at 3, 4, 6, 7 cents round to 5 and 1, 2 down to 0 and 8, 9, up to 10.
Electronic transactions still use the original price and most people pay that way anyway.
So, in theory, no one got stiffed by dropping the 1 and 2 cent coins. I presume something similar will come into play when the 5 goes. If anything, consumers pay less because all the 99c prices drop to 95c, and retailers save on cash handling expenses.
The banks however will continue to stiff everyone, like they always have, for electronic transactions that cost them almost nothing, but which they charge for as if they were cheques.
Electronic transactions still use the original price and most people pay that way anyway.
So, in theory, no one got stiffed by dropping the 1 and 2 cent coins. I presume something similar will come into play when the 5 goes. If anything, consumers pay less because all the 99c prices drop to 95c, and retailers save on cash handling expenses.
The banks however will continue to stiff everyone, like they always have, for electronic transactions that cost them almost nothing, but which they charge for as if they were cheques.
Oryan said:
Only if you buy just one thing.
Say you live in a city with 8% tax. An item is priced at a buck...with tax that's $1.08 and gets rounded up to $1.10. Those darn smart shopkeepers just scammed me out of two cents.
But what if I buy two of that item? That's $2.00 x 1.08 = $2.16, which rounds down to $2.15 and I make out by a penny.
Buy three and the store makes an extra penny. Buy four and you get two pennies free. Throw in the wide variety of goods and their prices, and it's pretty apparent that it's essentially impossible to price things such that the store gets much benefit from the rounding...it all evens out in the end.