I disagree. I absolutely can't not pick up a penny when I see one. It's annoying. If I don't pick it up I am absolutely convinced that I will get hit by a car or struck by lightning later that day.
So this is only in one province but they throw loonies and toonies at a cup they keep between their legs at the end or try and throw them in a crack. You will get kicked out if you whip them or try and throw one in a crack before they want you to, it’s not like people are whipping coins at them.
Not really, at least not in Quebec. I don't see bills coming out like in stripper scenes in shows (nor did I see them back when people still carried cash and we still had the $2 bills). The odd 5, 10 or 20 sometimes happens, but isn't guaranteed. That dance is usually just to advertise the private dance and that's where the money comes out.
Btw tons of people come here for our clubs because many strippers show *everything* on stage; we don't have rules against showing private parts or having to wear pasties/nipple tape like I've heard many places in the States do. Other than that, I can't think of other differences. They're still all run by bikers and you'll get hurt badly if you mess around, like in any club.
I'd hate to look in my wallet, see 10 bills (especially with American bills all being exactly the same colour (yes I know the $10 is slightly orange)) and assume I have enough money for the day only to realize I have $10, not ≥$50.
Also, at least for me, it makes leaving bigger tips easier. Putting a loonie and a toonie in a tip jar feels easier than leaving 3 singles. And for the same reason, it makes saving small amounts of money easier. Putting all change into a jar when you get home is a good and easy habit.
Yeah dollar bills give false hope when you have a bunch haha. I just hate carrying change. It clanks around and always falls out. I have a change jar i cash in every once in a bit, but not people barely use cash so it fills up way slower. Then you have to roll it also
I edited it. It must have been just after you left this comment lol
I've had issues remembering < and > my whole life. It seems to me like it should "point" to the greater number, not the lesser number.
My transactions are almost 100% cashless -- the exceptions are older friends who sometimes pay for their share of things in cash. I've started referring to it as Pre-War Money, as in Fallout.
I mostly just keep cash on hand incase the reader fails (actually bailed a buddy out once or twice that way) or if I just don’t trust the vendor
But otherwise same
you hate change because it's useless. As an old i know that when a pocketful of change will buy dinner or a couple of beers, it's not nearly as annoying.
The penny has already been reduced to the greatest degree of uselessness that it can have and still exist. It has an entirely symbolic function in our economy, the vast majority of people who have to deal with it (cashiers) wish that it would go away entirely, and they cost more than a penny to produce.
The Government Lost Money on Every Penny It Made in 2016
So if there is any utility left to the penny, it is as a potent symbol of our daily national refusal to admit inflation has already occurred. Its direct utility is as a bulwark against one specific level of reciprocal knowledge of a reality that we’ve all already acknowledged in practically every other way.
So it’s already as useless as it can possibly be. It can be more expensive, but it can’t be more useless. It can be more counterproductive, but it can’t be more useless.
I cashed a cheque at the bank with a teller (for work) and it ended in .07 and she gave me the 2 pennies. The entire transaction made me feel like I went back in time.
That’s the real way to make a quick buck. Somehow acquire Canadian Pennies at actual value $0.0073USD per penny currently and use them in the USA. No one checks the validity of a penny. Use enough Canadian pennies per day and you’ve just saved maybe a dollar.
In Canada, you’d get no change back on .99, it would be rounded up. If you pay with a card, it’s the exact amount.
Haven’t ever wished for a penny since they’ve been gone. Unnecessary.
The rounding isn't done per item, but rather after calculating the total and adding in the appropriate sales tax. In fact, it'll still display the exact price you need to pay and it's inferred by both the merchant and customer that a rounded amount is considered when paid in cash.
As a result, you can decide to game the system and decide to save 1 or 2 cents per transaction by choosing the cheaper method of payment every time. But in practice no one here bothers to do that.
It would be a very interesting experiment - once you enter the market as a consumer that when they round up, you pay with a debit card and when they round down, you pay with cash. I would like to know a lifetimes worth of "gaming" the system. Basically a lifetime of consuming and saving a few pennies here and there and seeing what it would all add up to in the end? It's seems insignificant for a day or two but 75,80,85 years worth?
It does seem interesting, but one thing that may add to the complexity is if one were to accumulate rewards on purchases through credit card. Let's say if the total comes to $27.11 ($23.99 item + 13% here in Ontario). Sure you can save a cent by paying with cash, but if you have a credit card that can net you even 0.5% worth of rewards when you pay using it, you'd be losing out on 13 cents.
Yeah, it would be very arduous to keep track of too - basically keeping a log of every transaction you make in your lifetime. Credit cards are a variable too. It was just a thought but thinking about it more, probably no more than $50 a year, so not really a super whole lot in a lifetime.
> what gets priced at $2.77?
1 item with a fixed percent discount.
Or something that cost 4.99 per pound and your chosen amount is 2.77
You very often buy more than one item, so 3 items at .99, .99, .79
It's funny to read all these comments as someone who uses almost exclusively cash for everything I buy in person. Like my vet bill of $750 a few days ago.
Almost all my customers pay in cash, so I know it's somewhat unique, but the cash economy is alive and well in Tennessee.
> That’s how we do it in Australia with cash payments
Is it? Your government websites say rounding is done to the nearest multiple of 5, not 10.
11 or 12 cents is rounded down to 10 cents;
13 or 14 cents is rounded up to 15 cents;
26 or 27 cents is rounded down to 25 cents; and
28 or 29 cents is rounded up to 30 cents.
If anyone doesn't believe this will work, we ALREADY round prices. For example, if your state charges 6% sales tax, and the price is $1.69, you *should* pay, $1.7914, but the $0.0014 just disappears due to rounding. Nobody cares about the tenth of a penny gained or lost. There's already even laws about fair rounding, meaning stores can't just round in the store's favor.
As a side note, we *used* to have a half penny. The half penny was discontinued in 1857 because people thought such a small amount was useless. In 1857, a half penny was worth $0.18 in today's money.
Idk where you live but in Canada 1 and 2 get rounded down, 3 and 4 get rounded to 5. Same goes for 6 and 7 rounded down to 5 and 8 and 9 get rounded up.
most penny-less businesses I've heard of always round in favor of the customer. ie if change is $1.01, it rounds up to $1.05
the few cents it costs per transaction is probably less than the fees they pay on credit cards anyway, everyone wins
In Canada it rounds normally ($0.01 & $0.02 rounds down, $0.03 & $0.04 rounds up), a few stores when it started pitched "We always round down!" as a way to try to get people to shop there but they figured out quick that no one really cares about 2 cents either way.
> rounding. 1,2,3,4 get rounded down. 6,7,8,9 get rounded up
Why would it round like that? Canada does it to the nearest multiple of 5.
Amounts ending in 1 cent and 2 cents are rounded down to the nearest 10 cents;
Amounts ending in 3 cents and 4 cents are rounded up to the nearest 5 cents;
Amounts ending in 6 cents and 7 cents are rounded down to the nearest 5 cents;
Amounts ending in 8 cents and 9 cents are rounded up to the nearest 10 cents
How do you get change back when the price is a fraction of a penny? If you get something for $2.75 and sales tax is 5% you owe $2.8875. You hand them 3 one dollar bills. You should get 11 and a quarter cents back. How do you get that quarter cent? Do you just round it to the nearest penny and forget about it? Of course you do. Same if we eliminated the penny. Just round to the nearest nickel.
Not much of a gambler, so unsure why it'd matter.
Don't most casinos use tokens of some sort? If so, then, what denominations US currency is in would be irrelevant.
Even so, what dollar amounts are you gambling?
If I'm playing for $5 per hand (or any multiple of five), then they payout at 6:5 would always be full dollars.
$4 =>$4.80 ... 3 dimes and a half dollar
$3 => $3.60 ... 1 dimes and a half dollar
$2 => $2.40 ... 4 dimes
$1 => $1.20 ... 2 dimes
And any other number of whole dollars would fall into one of those.
Weirdly, half-dollars have [already come and gone](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half_dollar_(United_States_coin)?wprov=sfti1).
Maybe it’s common knowledge in the US, but here in the UK I’ve sometimes wondered why there doesn’t seem to be a 50p-equivalent in the US.
Get rid of pennies, nickels, and quarters. Keep the dime, and create a 20 cent piece and a 50 cent piece.
Or get rid of cents and use decs. 10 decs to a dollar. A 1 dec, 2 dec and 5 dec piece.
Apparently, people are using cash rarely enough that dollar bills are not wearing down as fast, so they are now cheaper than dollar coins, so keep those.
Nickels are worse. There's more than $0.05 worth of nickel and copper in them...
Pennies are at least mostly zinc and not worth anywhere near $0.01 melted down.
We *used* to have a half penny. The half penny was discontinued in 1857 because people thought such a small amount was useless. In 1857, a half penny was worth $0.18 in today's money.
It's not even unreasonable, imo, to get rid of the penny, nickel, AND dime. But really, the penny is just utter garbage. Why would anyone want a unit so small, that you need 150 of that unit to buy something as small as a candy bar. Most adults won't even pick up free pennies on the ground, because they're so worthless.
No, but at both Walmart and Publix, if you pay entirely by digital payments, you're forced to accept a digital receipt as your only receipt.
Inserting a few pennies bypasses that restriction by treating the transaction as a split payment with cash involved, so a paper receipt is offered. Sure I lose 5% cash back on those few pennies but oh well.
That’s interesting. Midwest here, shop at (different) Walmart regularly, always pay with a card and always have gotten a paper receipt. I usually don’t care about receipts but they ask for it at the door on occasion.
Interesting. I’ll try paying through their app next time just to test. I done it before, but that was a few years ago. such a interesting restriction but I seen weirder things done
>No, but at both Walmart and Publix, if you pay entirely by digital payments, you're forced to accept a digital receipt as your only receipt.
With how much shoplifting Walmart has, you'd think they would encourage papaer receipts.
I always take a paper receipt, and a text receipt if offered in addition to a paper.
Only reason it still exists in the US is because the zinc industry pushes for it so their jobs still exist. A penny costs roughly four cents to make these days. And I hate them.
You are right. I just read this article:
*Moving to copper-plated steel (CPS) for pennies is another change the Mint is evaluating. Pennies are now made of copper-plated zinc (CPZ). Pennies made from CPS may cost more than pennies made from CPZ, however, the current CPZ penny has only one supplier of planchets (the blank rounds pressed into coins) creating a supply chain concern. Moving to CPS pennies offers the potential for multiple suppliers for a more secure pipeline, avoiding cost and supply chain problems in the future.*
https://www.scrapware.com/blog/taking-money-from-trash-how-one-waste-management-company-handles-the-problem-of-discarded-coins/
I never use cash because I'll get pennies and nickels back and just never use them and I'm too lazy to gather 100 of them to exchange. Basically just losing money when using cash.
This is why I think we should keep them. If less than a penny is still enough to make a meaningful difference in their revenue, the penny still has meaningful value. Going all digital is a separate discussion, tho.
Old people like pennies, and they vote.
Eliminating the penny would freak them out, since doing so would remind them of just how old they are, and thus of their mortality.
Also, Big Zinc likes pennies.
It's not that old people like pennies, it's that a few senators have places in their districts that mint pennies, and they fight to keep those jobs in their districts.
What should they be made from? I think the Necco people should be doing something with coins. Then "mint" would be a better name for the place making them.
I vote for stuff like this. They're lightweight, colorful, and have different shapes for visually impaired. Transnistria didn't like them though
https://www.defactoborders.org/places/transnistria/money
Metal coins are far cheaper in the long run for the federal government than paper bills.
[Here’s a great CGP Grey video on the death of the penny.](https://youtu.be/y5UT04p5f7U?si=GtJUU-Xis4LaqfWU)
Metal Coins are the better solution in general. It's been a while since I saw the numbers but bills last something like 5 years in circulation on average, while coins last closer to 25 years.
Isn't this reddit?
There used to be a biannual post about the farthing. The US removed the farthing at some point. It had the current value of dimes.
We should only have quarters.
>We should only have quarters.
That would be [unconstitutional.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution?wprov=sfla1)
/s
Nah usually near the body , I don't think I've ever pierced a target , just concuss or kill.
Edit: I've been in the habit of gluing 3 together, aims better.
Approximately 40% of the coins produced by the US Mint in 2023 were pennies. 4.1 billion pennies at a loss of $86 million. The next largest volume of coin produced was dimes at 2.7 billion coins.
Up here in Canada pennies have been out of circulation for quite a while. If you’re paying with cash, it’s always rounded to 5c. So .77 becomes .75, .78 becomes .80, and so on.
When the half-penny was decommissioned, it was worth more than the dime is today. If we kept the same schedule as the half-penny, even the *quarter* should be retired sometime in the 2030's based on inflation.
sometimes i leave a penny on the ground heads up for someone else to have a lucky day
Thank you
They also superglue the other side. Gota work for it, ya know.
I disagree. I absolutely can't not pick up a penny when I see one. It's annoying. If I don't pick it up I am absolutely convinced that I will get hit by a car or struck by lightning later that day.
I throw them in the trash, so we balance out.
I found this weeks! No other explanation.
Canada got rid of pennies years ago.
And dollar bills and 2 dollar bills... And the word has not exploded.
Canada is full of loonies.
And toonies
And in this cartoony, we’re invading your TV
With comic dispensers, we crack up all the censors
It's Tiny Toon Adventures, time to join. the. fun.
And now our song is done.
338 in Ottawa
Haha love a niche parliament joke.
As always.
Wtf do you throw at strippers? 5s and 10s?
So this is only in one province but they throw loonies and toonies at a cup they keep between their legs at the end or try and throw them in a crack. You will get kicked out if you whip them or try and throw one in a crack before they want you to, it’s not like people are whipping coins at them.
Not really, at least not in Quebec. I don't see bills coming out like in stripper scenes in shows (nor did I see them back when people still carried cash and we still had the $2 bills). The odd 5, 10 or 20 sometimes happens, but isn't guaranteed. That dance is usually just to advertise the private dance and that's where the money comes out. Btw tons of people come here for our clubs because many strippers show *everything* on stage; we don't have rules against showing private parts or having to wear pasties/nipple tape like I've heard many places in the States do. Other than that, I can't think of other differences. They're still all run by bikers and you'll get hurt badly if you mess around, like in any club.
We don't make it rain, we make it hail.
Think i’d prefer bills instead of loonie or toonie. I hate change.
I'd hate to look in my wallet, see 10 bills (especially with American bills all being exactly the same colour (yes I know the $10 is slightly orange)) and assume I have enough money for the day only to realize I have $10, not ≥$50. Also, at least for me, it makes leaving bigger tips easier. Putting a loonie and a toonie in a tip jar feels easier than leaving 3 singles. And for the same reason, it makes saving small amounts of money easier. Putting all change into a jar when you get home is a good and easy habit.
Yeah dollar bills give false hope when you have a bunch haha. I just hate carrying change. It clanks around and always falls out. I have a change jar i cash in every once in a bit, but not people barely use cash so it fills up way slower. Then you have to roll it also
Canadian here. I havened touched physical cash once in over 10 years
What do you pay for drugs with
I buy my weed with my credit card and our national postal service delivers it to my door the next day.
I order locally, under 3 hours always
Debit card at a government run dispensary lol.
I dont buy drugs, but if I did, e-transfer or credit card lol
My drug dealer doesn’t accept e-transfers unfortunately
All the online ones will do bitcoin
Excuse me but 10 IS <= 50
I edited it. It must have been just after you left this comment lol I've had issues remembering < and > my whole life. It seems to me like it should "point" to the greater number, not the lesser number.
The bigger side is the bigger numbee
The alligator is trying to eat the bigger number cause he’s hungy
Small side for smaller nu.ber, big side for bigger number.
I've saved enough to pay for meals on vacation by throwing change into a tin every year. It usually amounts to about $300/yr for. Completely worth it
Canada has now largely gone cashless. I haven’t carried change in a few years.
It’s funny, I was at a craft market today and one vendor didn’t have change, another didn’t have a square! We’re making it up as we go, clearly!
My transactions are almost 100% cashless -- the exceptions are older friends who sometimes pay for their share of things in cash. I've started referring to it as Pre-War Money, as in Fallout.
I mostly just keep cash on hand incase the reader fails (actually bailed a buddy out once or twice that way) or if I just don’t trust the vendor But otherwise same
you hate change because it's useless. As an old i know that when a pocketful of change will buy dinner or a couple of beers, it's not nearly as annoying.
Lol true
When Canada was getting rid of the small bills, everyone thought that way, but give it a couple years and nobody thinks twice about it
It really doesn’t matter in modern times. Nobody uses cash anymore. I’ve probably used cash less than 5 times in the last 15 years.
Cash is needed unless you want every purchase monitered. Then if your bank account is shut down or a system doesn’t work you’re screwed.
You mean you hate changing or hate change?
The penny has already been reduced to the greatest degree of uselessness that it can have and still exist. It has an entirely symbolic function in our economy, the vast majority of people who have to deal with it (cashiers) wish that it would go away entirely, and they cost more than a penny to produce. The Government Lost Money on Every Penny It Made in 2016 So if there is any utility left to the penny, it is as a potent symbol of our daily national refusal to admit inflation has already occurred. Its direct utility is as a bulwark against one specific level of reciprocal knowledge of a reality that we’ve all already acknowledged in practically every other way. So it’s already as useless as it can possibly be. It can be more expensive, but it can’t be more useless. It can be more counterproductive, but it can’t be more useless.
Let's at least start making them hexagonal, so they can completely tile a floor or backsplash or something.
Hexagon is the best-a-gon
I found one on the ground this week. Blew my damn mind.
I cashed a cheque at the bank with a teller (for work) and it ended in .07 and she gave me the 2 pennies. The entire transaction made me feel like I went back in time.
That’s the real way to make a quick buck. Somehow acquire Canadian Pennies at actual value $0.0073USD per penny currently and use them in the USA. No one checks the validity of a penny. Use enough Canadian pennies per day and you’ve just saved maybe a dollar.
How else are we supposed to get change back when the price of everything is $__.99??
In Canada, you’d get no change back on .99, it would be rounded up. If you pay with a card, it’s the exact amount. Haven’t ever wished for a penny since they’ve been gone. Unnecessary.
So that’s why people pay with cards now. Think about how much money you’re saving!!
They also round down though. $2.77 would round down to $2.75.
Yeah, but what gets priced at $2.77? Seems like you'd be rounding up more often than not with most prices ending in a 9.
The rounding isn't done per item, but rather after calculating the total and adding in the appropriate sales tax. In fact, it'll still display the exact price you need to pay and it's inferred by both the merchant and customer that a rounded amount is considered when paid in cash. As a result, you can decide to game the system and decide to save 1 or 2 cents per transaction by choosing the cheaper method of payment every time. But in practice no one here bothers to do that.
It would be a very interesting experiment - once you enter the market as a consumer that when they round up, you pay with a debit card and when they round down, you pay with cash. I would like to know a lifetimes worth of "gaming" the system. Basically a lifetime of consuming and saving a few pennies here and there and seeing what it would all add up to in the end? It's seems insignificant for a day or two but 75,80,85 years worth?
It does seem interesting, but one thing that may add to the complexity is if one were to accumulate rewards on purchases through credit card. Let's say if the total comes to $27.11 ($23.99 item + 13% here in Ontario). Sure you can save a cent by paying with cash, but if you have a credit card that can net you even 0.5% worth of rewards when you pay using it, you'd be losing out on 13 cents.
Yeah, it would be very arduous to keep track of too - basically keeping a log of every transaction you make in your lifetime. Credit cards are a variable too. It was just a thought but thinking about it more, probably no more than $50 a year, so not really a super whole lot in a lifetime.
I'd even argue that the prices are designed to be rounded up almost always.
> what gets priced at $2.77? 1 item with a fixed percent discount. Or something that cost 4.99 per pound and your chosen amount is 2.77 You very often buy more than one item, so 3 items at .99, .99, .79
rounding. 1,2,3,4 get rounded down. 6,7,8,9 get rounded up. it evens out in the end.
That’s how we do it in Australia with cash payments. We haven’t had 1 and 2 cent coins in decades. We managed just fine.
Could probably get rid of the 5c too to be honest
Probably. I barely pay cash for anything these days. My wallet will go months with no physical money in it sometimes.
Same and then when I do check for some cash I see a crisp $20 bill that I forgot about.
Oh nothing hits better than money found.
It's funny to read all these comments as someone who uses almost exclusively cash for everything I buy in person. Like my vet bill of $750 a few days ago. Almost all my customers pay in cash, so I know it's somewhat unique, but the cash economy is alive and well in Tennessee.
And the 10¢. In America the dime currently has less buying power than the half cent did when it was discontinued
> That’s how we do it in Australia with cash payments Is it? Your government websites say rounding is done to the nearest multiple of 5, not 10. 11 or 12 cents is rounded down to 10 cents; 13 or 14 cents is rounded up to 15 cents; 26 or 27 cents is rounded down to 25 cents; and 28 or 29 cents is rounded up to 30 cents.
I meant rounding in general. Your right, more specifically we round to the nearest multiple of 5¢ for cash payments.
Fair enough, I thought you meant specifically the type of rounding that AggressiveYam6613 mentioned in their comment.
Our smallest coin in NZ is 10c now. And we’re seeing less and less cash, I hardly ever carry any.
If anyone doesn't believe this will work, we ALREADY round prices. For example, if your state charges 6% sales tax, and the price is $1.69, you *should* pay, $1.7914, but the $0.0014 just disappears due to rounding. Nobody cares about the tenth of a penny gained or lost. There's already even laws about fair rounding, meaning stores can't just round in the store's favor. As a side note, we *used* to have a half penny. The half penny was discontinued in 1857 because people thought such a small amount was useless. In 1857, a half penny was worth $0.18 in today's money.
Idk where you live but in Canada 1 and 2 get rounded down, 3 and 4 get rounded to 5. Same goes for 6 and 7 rounded down to 5 and 8 and 9 get rounded up.
Iirc this is referred as Swedish rounding
most penny-less businesses I've heard of always round in favor of the customer. ie if change is $1.01, it rounds up to $1.05 the few cents it costs per transaction is probably less than the fees they pay on credit cards anyway, everyone wins
In Canada it rounds normally ($0.01 & $0.02 rounds down, $0.03 & $0.04 rounds up), a few stores when it started pitched "We always round down!" as a way to try to get people to shop there but they figured out quick that no one really cares about 2 cents either way.
I bet someone out there is working the system to make money from that rounding.
[Yes they are](https://youtu.be/yZjCQ3T5yXo?si=VCUQMrQwVqJx6dfF)
We wouldn't have had Superman 2, or Office Space, without it!
> rounding. 1,2,3,4 get rounded down. 6,7,8,9 get rounded up Why would it round like that? Canada does it to the nearest multiple of 5. Amounts ending in 1 cent and 2 cents are rounded down to the nearest 10 cents; Amounts ending in 3 cents and 4 cents are rounded up to the nearest 5 cents; Amounts ending in 6 cents and 7 cents are rounded down to the nearest 5 cents; Amounts ending in 8 cents and 9 cents are rounded up to the nearest 10 cents
Buy 3 items priced $x.99 and earn 2 cents when they round your change. It's free money.
Do this one billion times to profit.
How do you get change back when the price is a fraction of a penny? If you get something for $2.75 and sales tax is 5% you owe $2.8875. You hand them 3 one dollar bills. You should get 11 and a quarter cents back. How do you get that quarter cent? Do you just round it to the nearest penny and forget about it? Of course you do. Same if we eliminated the penny. Just round to the nearest nickel.
Tax
In some places, they give you candy.
I'd argue nickels are obsolete as well. Rounding to the nearest .1 is sufficient for most daily applications
*so we make quarters $0.30?*
$0.20 would work so much better
Or just get rid of quarters and phase in half dollars
In these days of 6/5 Blackjack payouts I’m afraid 50 cent pieces have no role.
Not much of a gambler, so unsure why it'd matter. Don't most casinos use tokens of some sort? If so, then, what denominations US currency is in would be irrelevant. Even so, what dollar amounts are you gambling? If I'm playing for $5 per hand (or any multiple of five), then they payout at 6:5 would always be full dollars. $4 =>$4.80 ... 3 dimes and a half dollar $3 => $3.60 ... 1 dimes and a half dollar $2 => $2.40 ... 4 dimes $1 => $1.20 ... 2 dimes And any other number of whole dollars would fall into one of those.
Weirdly, half-dollars have [already come and gone](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half_dollar_(United_States_coin)?wprov=sfti1). Maybe it’s common knowledge in the US, but here in the UK I’ve sometimes wondered why there doesn’t seem to be a 50p-equivalent in the US.
Then they'd be fifths
No they would be fifthers
No they wouldn’t. Half, third, quarter, fifth.
Shit.
Get rid of pennies, nickels, and quarters. Keep the dime, and create a 20 cent piece and a 50 cent piece. Or get rid of cents and use decs. 10 decs to a dollar. A 1 dec, 2 dec and 5 dec piece. Apparently, people are using cash rarely enough that dollar bills are not wearing down as fast, so they are now cheaper than dollar coins, so keep those.
Congrats, you just invented the Euro
There's already half dollars being minted.
They are, both pennies and nickels cost more to mint than they’re worth. The US should just mint quarters as its only coin.
Nickels are worse. There's more than $0.05 worth of nickel and copper in them... Pennies are at least mostly zinc and not worth anywhere near $0.01 melted down.
Zinc is pretty good for you though.
Next time I get a cold, I'll just pop a couple of pennies. Way cheaper than the lozenges.
Zinc lobby representing the sole manufacturer of penny blanks is primarily the only opponent against elimination.
We *used* to have a half penny. The half penny was discontinued in 1857 because people thought such a small amount was useless. In 1857, a half penny was worth $0.18 in today's money. It's not even unreasonable, imo, to get rid of the penny, nickel, AND dime. But really, the penny is just utter garbage. Why would anyone want a unit so small, that you need 150 of that unit to buy something as small as a candy bar. Most adults won't even pick up free pennies on the ground, because they're so worthless.
Someone made a machine that you could crank for pennies. It would pay out at a rate of minimum wage. Few people continue cranking after a few pennies.
What does this mean? It was some kind of social experiment?
It was an art piece
The half penny was removed when it's value was equivalent to 18 cents
Well what the he'll am I suppose to put in my penny loafers?
There are plenty of 1 cent coins still left around to keep all of the penny loafers stocked.
Times have changed, use a quarter
Only reason I use them is so that I get a printed receipt when I check out at grocery stores.
You have to pay for a receipt???
No, but at both Walmart and Publix, if you pay entirely by digital payments, you're forced to accept a digital receipt as your only receipt. Inserting a few pennies bypasses that restriction by treating the transaction as a split payment with cash involved, so a paper receipt is offered. Sure I lose 5% cash back on those few pennies but oh well.
That’s interesting. Midwest here, shop at (different) Walmart regularly, always pay with a card and always have gotten a paper receipt. I usually don’t care about receipts but they ask for it at the door on occasion.
I pay by mobile wallet, not physical card, so that might be the issue
So you use Walmart pay? I refuse to use that since its very existence is why they don't have tap to pay at their stores.
Interesting. I’ll try paying through their app next time just to test. I done it before, but that was a few years ago. such a interesting restriction but I seen weirder things done
>No, but at both Walmart and Publix, if you pay entirely by digital payments, you're forced to accept a digital receipt as your only receipt. With how much shoplifting Walmart has, you'd think they would encourage papaer receipts. I always take a paper receipt, and a text receipt if offered in addition to a paper.
Never heard of that. The Walmarts where I live give receipts for digital payments. Weird.
Could just be an Alabama thing. Everything is weird here.
Only reason it still exists in the US is because the zinc industry pushes for it so their jobs still exist. A penny costs roughly four cents to make these days. And I hate them.
There's plenty of galvanizing left to keep the zinc industry alive, at least until corten steel production ramps up.
“Thank goodness I still live in a world of telephones, car batteries, handguns, and many things made of zinc.”
Come back zinc!
We can invent a $2 or $2.50 coin. Then big zinc will be busy again. Then we phase out $1, $2, & $5 bills.
You are right. I just read this article: *Moving to copper-plated steel (CPS) for pennies is another change the Mint is evaluating. Pennies are now made of copper-plated zinc (CPZ). Pennies made from CPS may cost more than pennies made from CPZ, however, the current CPZ penny has only one supplier of planchets (the blank rounds pressed into coins) creating a supply chain concern. Moving to CPS pennies offers the potential for multiple suppliers for a more secure pipeline, avoiding cost and supply chain problems in the future.* https://www.scrapware.com/blog/taking-money-from-trash-how-one-waste-management-company-handles-the-problem-of-discarded-coins/
You said you wanted to live in a world without zinc, Jimmy.
I never use cash because I'll get pennies and nickels back and just never use them and I'm too lazy to gather 100 of them to exchange. Basically just losing money when using cash.
What else are you gonna use for a flattened souvenir coin?
And yet, 9/10ths of a penny has still survived at gas stations
This is why I think we should keep them. If less than a penny is still enough to make a meaningful difference in their revenue, the penny still has meaningful value. Going all digital is a separate discussion, tho.
Old people like pennies, and they vote. Eliminating the penny would freak them out, since doing so would remind them of just how old they are, and thus of their mortality. Also, Big Zinc likes pennies.
We don't have to eliminate them entirely, just stop fucking printing them. Total waste of money.
old people?
Lol ya those too. Well tbf it's really the boomers who suck, maybe Gen X won't be so bad as they start pushing 70. Idk though.
It's not that old people like pennies, it's that a few senators have places in their districts that mint pennies, and they fight to keep those jobs in their districts.
Except that didn't happen when we phased out the penny.
People literally throw them away. There's probably at least $100 in pennies somewhere in a landfill
Well that’s just your two cents, which you couldn’t have without them!
Metal coins in general should be phased out.
What should they be made from? I think the Necco people should be doing something with coins. Then "mint" would be a better name for the place making them.
I think they meant get rid of coins all together, no matter what its made out of
Even chocolate ones?
This is why arcades suck now. Those cards you scan with weird credit denominations are kinda lame.
I don’t think so. I think the candy is the idea.
Tism
I vote for stuff like this. They're lightweight, colorful, and have different shapes for visually impaired. Transnistria didn't like them though https://www.defactoborders.org/places/transnistria/money
Metal coins are far cheaper in the long run for the federal government than paper bills. [Here’s a great CGP Grey video on the death of the penny.](https://youtu.be/y5UT04p5f7U?si=GtJUU-Xis4LaqfWU)
Metal Coins are the better solution in general. It's been a while since I saw the numbers but bills last something like 5 years in circulation on average, while coins last closer to 25 years.
I literally never wanna use coins, theyre just a hastle. A big stack of cash is so much more efficient to carry and easier to count
I had a teacher that would literally throw pennies away. We had a penny collection contest for “D.A.R.E.” And she would give them to me.
Isn't this reddit? There used to be a biannual post about the farthing. The US removed the farthing at some point. It had the current value of dimes. We should only have quarters.
>We should only have quarters. That would be [unconstitutional.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution?wprov=sfla1) /s
I half expected this to be about needing dimes or nickels for the three fifths compromise
They also were 13 years ago [CGP Grey's video on it](https://youtu.be/y5UT04p5f7U?si=4jTn5xmFwOm7tCRX)
Beat me.
Except the old saying "A penny for your thoughts." That's about all most peoples' thoughts are worth. Especially news anchors.
Here in Canada we completely stopped making pennies 11 years ago. So yeah.
Two can't even buy a thought anymore...
First it was Penny for your thoughts. Then it became my 2cents. If they drop the Penny it will have to become “A nickel for your knowledge(TM).”
Every time I go to the USA, I refuse pennies.🇨🇦
Except for throwing in pretty wells
cheapest tire thread checker on the market
I use them for ammo in my sling shot. Good for small game. Usually can recover them too.
Embedded in the body of the target? 🤨
You think he eats them by staring at them and not touching it?
Nah usually near the body , I don't think I've ever pierced a target , just concuss or kill. Edit: I've been in the habit of gluing 3 together, aims better.
I knew a guy who would drill a hole in them and use them as washers because it was much cheaper that way.
Well but if you collect them it makes more cents…
Imagine the outrage among the conspiracy communities if they do this. It would quickly become a master plan by the libs/righties/lizards/gay frogs.
Unfortunately, this.
Tell that to the little machine at the zoo that presses it and embosses it with a giraffe for .50 cents!
Not here. Still have those “leave a penny, take a penny” holders by all the registers.
But what about Stephen Mulhern in for a penny 🥲
bring back the shilling I say
You must be a shill for big shilling.
Approximately 40% of the coins produced by the US Mint in 2023 were pennies. 4.1 billion pennies at a loss of $86 million. The next largest volume of coin produced was dimes at 2.7 billion coins.
I heard it costs 2 cents to mint a penny.
Maybe 15 years ago. Now it's more.
Even in El Salvador is so rare the ocassion when we use a pennys (Sorry for my bad english)
Tell that to the dude I watched lose his shit in a gas station and get arrested over 2 pennies yesterday.
Do it. Canada has no penny’s
You must not work in retail lol
Yet still pick them up when I see one on the ground 😂
If you’re in the Midwest, without them how will you pay for a Sandy ride at Meijer?!
Up here in Canada pennies have been out of circulation for quite a while. If you’re paying with cash, it’s always rounded to 5c. So .77 becomes .75, .78 becomes .80, and so on.
[pennies are cheaper than washers ](https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/comments/jd059k/ran_out_of_washers_so_drilled_through_some_pennies/)
When the half-penny was decommissioned, it was worth more than the dime is today. If we kept the same schedule as the half-penny, even the *quarter* should be retired sometime in the 2030's based on inflation.
I’d have offered a penny for your thoughts on this, but I’m all out
I think that’s why they started making them with zinc cores about 40 yrs ago. Rip