Pennies

[Peachy]

An article I saw on the web this week talked about how pennies were pretty worthless these days and how it costs more to produce a penny than it is worth.
So this question or discussion is mostly for everyone in the European Monetary Union, the U.S., Canada, the UK and all other countries that have one cent or one penny coins:


(I dug up all the cent/penny coins I could find from my coin colletion, including the Aussie 1 cent coin no longer in circulation)

Should we stop using 1 cent / 1 penny coins altogether?

I think y'all can guess my opinion: No, I want to keep my precious penny coins - they're inexpensive objects to collect, and it feels weird to buy an item for 1.99 and not receive a penny in change when paying with a 2 Euros coin.

Peachy

 

[Vladimir]

I agree! Collecting coins is fun! 8D

 

[Charlie]

How do they give change for stuff that's .99?

We could listen to the Monster Raving Loony party and introduce a 99p coin!

I do hate pennies though, but I don't I'm ready for a world that can do without them.

 

[Squigma]

But we... need a penny, surely? Because without it, we wouldn't be able to pay for things with odd-numbered prices that aren't multiples of 5! With a penny you can somehow make every possible sum of money... but take it away and there are some sums of money you wouldn't be able to make! That'd just be... weird!

 

[PuddleFopsKit]

As a coin dealer, I'll say this: Pennies these days, are about 80% copper or so, I'd have to check my book to say for sure though.. The remainder of that is to Nickel, and zinc. They really don't cost too much to produce, but they definently cost more than a cent.. Pennies from before 1982, were closer to 90% copper,(excluding the 1043 steel cent, of course.) and those are the ones I collect. I believe modern pennies should be made from stainless steel, just as they were in 1943. Cheaper that way..

Ultimately though, pennies should keep getting prduced, If they stopped making them, there would a wierd gap in the coinage, and I believe it would cause problems. But, if they did stop producing them, I would be sitting on a gold mind of copper with my penny collection.

 

[EmeraldsAndLime]

Well, in Australia, all prices are rounded to the nearest 5 cents, as that is the lowest denomination.

I think the way it generally goes is:

1, 2 cents - Rounded down ($1.01, $1.02 becomes $1.00)

3, 4, 6 cents - Rounded to the 5 cent mark ($1.03, $1.04, $1.06 become $1.05)

7, 8, 9 cents - Rounded up ($1.07, $1.08, $1.09 become $1.10)

 

[andysetra]

Rounding up makes sense. As pennies become less and less relevant, people don't care about such small amounts of money anyway. Case in point, the reason the government hates me:

...whenever I have leftover change I save it, roll up and deposit nickels, dimes and quarters, and save the pennies. I have more kicking around somewhere too!

 

[avery]

i think the way australia does it makes sense: every price is divisible by 5 cents. the trouble with that is that in most parts of the US we charge sales tax on a lot of goods and services. that means that something can be priced at $3.50, but when they ring you up for it they'll add 8%. so almost everything you buy is going to wind up costing something weird like $3.78.

the state of oregon doesn't charge sales tax, however, so in my opinion pennies are totally useless there. i think they should abolish them! i think when you cross the border you should be required to pull over so that they can search your car, and you'd be turned back if you were trying to smuggle any pennies into the state!

i used to work at a farmer's market where we didn't charge any sales tax. every price was divisible by 5. it was so nice not having to deal with pennies! our cash register was broken and we had to count all the change in our heads, but it didn't even matter! it was easy!

 

[EmeraldsAndLime]

Well, here it's no trouble at all.

Only the final cost get rounded, and a lot of our prices are already tax-included. So whatever the final amount says on the register, is the price that gets rounded. Because even here we sell stuff at amounts not divisible by 5. In your example, the $3.78 would get taken up to $3.80.

Sometimes it can work in your favour, other times not. But I don't see anyone kicking up a storm over a few cents.

 

[Pramrider]

As a coin dealer, I'll say this: Pennies should be made from stainless steel, just as they were in 1943. Cheaper that way..

My opinion is to keep the penny coin denomination.

Yep, Chromos, I've still got a bunch of wheat pennies that were in my dad's collection. Several of them are the war time steel pennies from 1943. I was in the second grade when the Lincoln Memorial pennies came into circulation and remember having them in change the first time to use for buying milk at school for lunch, which was 3 cents at the time.

~Pramrider

 

[Peachy]

Getting rid of small denominations isn't really a problem. All prices are rounded to the next denomination that is still in circulation.
So if we get rid of 1 and 2 cent coins, prices like 1.02 and 1.01 will be rounded to 1.00, prices like 1.03 and 1.04 to 1.05 etc.
Denmark, for instance, used 50 and 25 øre coins (100 øre = 1 krone). That means any amount like 1.01 to 1.12 will be rounded to 1 krone, while amounts between 1.13 and 1.24 will become 1.25.
It's not that big of a deal. The Netherlands, for instance, allow stores to round prices to the nearest amount ending with 5 cents. It's voluntary, not required, because 1 and 2 Eurocent coins remain legal tender in the Netherlands (as in the rest of Europe).

As for sales tax and weird prices: In Europe, sales tax is - by law - included in the final price. I.e. if you see an item for 1.99 EUR on the shelf, you pay 1.99 EUR, which already includes the 19% or 7% (in the case of Germany) sales tax. It's up to the merchant to calculate how much of that amount goes to the government.

However, stores will most likely keep the 1.99 prices even if pennies are discontinued, making you think the item is less than 2 currency units while, in reality, there is no way you can get that one penny back.

I, for one, always spend my small change as soon as possible. SOmetimes, cashiers give me a weird look when I give them a seemingly weird sum of coins, but once they punch that into their register and realize that my change is a nice even number, their face lights up :biggrin:

Peachy

 

[BluTack]

Should we stop using 1 cent / 1 penny coins altogether?

No. Cos that penny you found in Manchester can in very handy when you bought that burger. All you needed was 1p.

And there will be no such things as penny sweets ether.

 

[Peachy]

No. Cos that penny you found in Manchester can in very handy when you bought that burger. All you needed was 1p.

And there will be no such things as penny sweets ether.

Ahh...the Manchester "Beer and a Burger"-deal! How could I forget that we claimed that territory for the old forum, and that penny I found earlier that day helped me so much. Here's the evidence:



Peachy

 

[Martin]

Well here they already do like peachy said but it is possible to get it back if you want to (though you'll have to tell them to give it back which will probably be seen by everyone else as a fuss about nothing) I think they should be kept at least until the time when the stores don't say 1.99 though they'll probably like they used to do with the guilder then make it 1.95

 

[Angel-In-Diapers]

I want to keep my pennies...

 

[the0silent0alchemist]

oh.. and on the issue of coinage and mony.. when i was n hawaii i couldnt believe your currency.. its SOOO confusing.. the bills are the worst.. they all look the same.

for the coins here.. as the value of the con increases so des the size.. there are 6 types of coin in australia in circulation 5c, 10c, 20c, 50c, $1 and $2 and to make the dollar and two dollar oins easier to identify weve used an alloy for them that.. unlike the normal silvery cupro-nickle the $1-2 coins are a brassey gold colour caused by adding small amounts of aluminium to the mixture although in terms of size and shape.. the 50c and $1-2 coins are slightly different... the 50c con is dstinctive in two ways.

-fisrstly it is the largest and secondly it is a 12 sided shape and around 3cm wide

the $1 coin is a tiny bit larger than a 10 cent coin, about 2 and a half centimetres in diameter and also abot 1.5 times thcker

 

[andysetra]

oh.. and on the issue of coinage and mony.. when i was n hawaii i couldnt believe your currency.. its SOOO confusing.. the bills are the worst.. they all look the same.

Every time I go to the US, I get thrown off by their bills. They're all the same colour! Plus...I always think I have more money than I do because the big wad of bills I have ends up being $1 bills :sad:

Colourful money isn't 'fruity', it's functional

 

[ayanna]

You know the best thing about pennies? You take 'em out of your pocket (or purse) at the end of the day 'n drop 'em in a jar...and at the end of the year you roll 'em up 'n take 'em to the bank and VOILA you've got REAL CASH! *luffles pennies*

And I'm soooooooooo glad I'm not the only one who dislikes the US paper money. They have the audacity to laugh at Canadian paper money, telling us it looks like 'monopoly' money! NO NO and NO! The monopoly money looks like money the world over (ie different colours for different denominations). At least we can tell at a glance what bill(s) we are holding in our hands!

In Canada our paper money used to be all one colour (differing shades) ie the five (5) dollar bill was all shades of blue, but now we are adding in other colours to make them even prettier than before (I think it's something to do with added security features too). Anyway...we have 5, 10, 20, 50, 100 (there is a 1000 bill but I don't think it's in circulation any more although it may be)...anyway the colours are 5-blue, 10-purple, 20-green, 50-red, 100-brown and the 1000 was (maybe still is) orange-ish.

We also have coins which (except for the 10-cent piece) are graduated sizes.
1 cent, 5 cent, 10 cent, 25 cent, 50 cent (not really a circulation coin but it is accepted as legal tender), 1 dollar and 2 dollar coins.

All Canadian coins are made of steel with an electro-plated copper or nickel finish.



EDIT: Images are not actual size!

 

[Point]

1000 yen =~ 1.50USD

SO! 1 yen =~ .0015USD

Fix'd

I think we should take pennies and make them into weapons dropped from planes. Bombs cost thousands... a sack of 5000 pennies ($50) would do the same if dropped from high enough!

 

[ayanna]

I forgot another thing that pennies are good for...MAKING WISHES! Who really wants to throw a 'loonie' (that's what we call our 1-dollar coin 'cause it has a loon on it (the bird, not the queen, although she can be kinda 'loonie' too...mwahahah!) into a wishing well/fountain/off a bridge/whatever. Just toss a penny, make a wish, and TADA!

There are tons of uses for pennies, actually.

• A small sack of pennies (like maybe 50, not 5000!) would make a nice paperweight.
• Pennies are also good for slipping under an uneven table leg to make the table level!
• And, of course, as Point pointed out (hahaha) a nice big bag of them could be used as a bomb. When the bag hits the ground pennies are gonna shoot out of it...if the bag didn't hit you on the head the flying pennies will get you in the end! :-D

Can anyone think of more uses for pennies?