I keep it. I pick up pennies, dimes nickels and I don’t have any reason to care if you think i’m wasting time. I’ve got a bottle full and i intend to keep saving it, because it will add up and i have that kind of time.
In college towns, ATMs generally still give out fives. College students tend to be poor.
I never throw away change - I carry a small coin purse in my pocket (stops the coins wearing a hole in the lining anyway, and means I don’t jingle when I walk), and I pay the exact amount in change for some transactions.
I’m glad other people throw it away though, because I pick it up. My Christmas lunch this year will be funded entirely from found change.
You don’t have old ladies with coin purses full of pennies where you live?
You miss littering? Bwuh?
I assume you mean that it’s unethical for the folks who value the coins…not for me, who does not value them (beyond their monetary value). Wasting 12 cents is not inherently unethical.
At the risk of beating a dead horse, throwing away 12 cents in change is just about the least wasteful thing I do in my life. All of us use resources in ways that aren’t entirely necessary; we do a cost-benefit analysis and do what makes sense for us. To me, carrying around coins is annoying, so my quality of life increases by more than 12 cents when I throw away the change.
And to address a common question, I’m stoked on those rare occasions when I receive change AND the vendor has a donation or tip jar. But as I mentioned earlier, I’d say my most common site for using cash is when buying a bit of candy for my kid, and none of these vendors has a cash jar nearby.
Finally, I will not throw coins on the ground. This, to me, is unethical. I’d be annoyed to see a pile of change on the ground – don’t clutter my environment.
Don’t you all think she is God anyway? 
Oh, no, right, “God save the Queen!” Our money has dead presidents on it so it’s not like it’s any closer to god, and I am not honestly sure at this moment what rupees have on them.
And I have never found cash transactions to be faster. It depends on how organized the person is, however. When I am in line and it comes my turn, I have my debit card out when I get up there, and immediately go to the swipey-thingie and swipe the card and put in the PIN and do everything I can. Then I only need to press one button to confirm the receipt. And I don’t even have to sign, for a debit card.
Nothing is slower than that stupid lady who not only uses a check but insists on balancing her checkbook right there, too, instead of just moving out of the line a bit and doing it on her cart. Nope, she’s got to do it right there, usually blocking the swipey thingie too. Sometimes i want to kick her. And she’s not always old, either.
My feelings on change have beendiscussedpreviously.
I pay cash probably 3 times a week or so, and always toss the pennies and nickels away (I leave them on a counter if I can, drop them on the sidewalk if I can’t).
The rest go into the charity/tip thing if there is one; otherwise they go in my car’s change pocket.
My church’s women’s club gives out “Mite boxes” – reference to the parable of the poor woman who gave her all, even it it was just a mite. They’re just fold up cardboard boxes with a slot to stick coins through. I put all the coins that I get into one of those those and, yes, I’m the sort that will pick up pennies off of sidewalks.
The Mite boxes get collected and the accumulation is put toward various charitable things. I don’t remember the exact amounts, but at least one year our church’s beneficiary was the Heifer Project and I remember being amazed at the size of the herd the change from just one ordinary size suburban church bought.
OK, haven’t read the whole thread, so some of this may have been mentioned:
One, I make it a habit not to spend my loose change; I have a coffee can in my bedroom closet. Loose change goes into it. When I feel the need to spend $80.00 on a spa afternoon, or lunch and shopping with girlfriends, I exchange my coffee-can money for folding money, and there I go: a treat for myself without touching the household budget!
BUT if I really didn’t want to be ‘bothered’ with small change, I would ‘drop’ it casually on the ground. Some little kid (or maybe down-on-their-luck adult) will find it and feel like it’s their lucky day! In fact, sometimes I purposely drop a dollar bill on the ground for just that purpose. The enjoyment I get out of thinking that someone is going to find that buck and feel suddenly good about their day. . .that enjoyment is worth more than a dollar to me!
Change into the big tupperware pot on the bookshelf at the end of each day, $1s and $5s into the sock drawer (all facing the same way, same way up too), then bundled into increments of $100 when necessary. I also don’t spend $1s or $5s unless absolutely necessary as a kind of forced savings technique. I know its illogical, but there it works for me - I think much harder about breaking a $20 to buy something on impulse than I do with a $5 or a $1.
The notes add up quickly this way, though less so than when I used to drive up to Philly & back twice every two weeks (breaking a $20 for each toll racks it up). I cashed them in last September and had $8000 for a downpayment on my new car, then again in February to buy a nice TV. The coins build up much less quickly, but there was still enough last time it overflowed to get enough of an Amazon certificate from Coinstar to buy a friend a Wii as a get well soon present.
There’s also a satisfaction I get from seeing the coins build up.
I keep paper bills. All the change (minus a few quarters now and then for the car) gets tossed into a floor vase. Usually takes a year for it to fill up, then I take it to the bank to get counted (for free-- nice perk). I average $300-$400 a year.
I almost always do this right before my big summer vacation so I have a little extra “free” pocket money.
I have, however, stopped picking up pennies. I won’t throw them out if I find them, but it really isn’t even worth my time anymore to stoop over for anything less than a nickel.
We have a lot of cash using folks around here that will wait until the transaction is almost over to rifle through their purses and pockets for their wallets, then will attempt to give exact change. It’s rare that you get one who’s quick about counting change, so it seems to take forever. In contrast, most of the credit and debit card users seem to be pretty confident with the system-- the vast majority of places where I use my card lets me swipe it as soon as the first item is rung up.
I really hate getting behind someone writing a check-- I don’t tend to write checks for anything but bills and the occasional large purchase; in those cases, the check is already written out to the person/company it’s intended for and only takes a fraction of a minute to sign.
Also: I don’t quite fathom throwing out change, but I’ve been short on cash and living hand-to-mouth in the past, and my family was always pretty frugal about saving and rolling change, so it’s a completely foreign concept to me.
I understand what you mean about that. I was always told that if you are a wise steward of your money you will be rewarded. If you throw even pennies away you are asking for poverty. Pennies can be a pain but during Lent we have operation rice bowl and I take all the pennies from a bucket and fill up the bowls and bring them in for Easter. You can also bring them to Walmart and dump them in a machine that gives you cash for the pennies with a small fee.
OP here. The throngs will be happy to hear the following story: after gymnastics class today I bought my kid a snack from the candy machine for 85 cents. Another boy from his class came along and I gave him the change left over from my purchase. (I’d have given it to my own son only he would have given it back 10 minutes later, simply delaying the inevitable).
I thought of you when I did it.
You buckle to board pressure?? Sigh. You should have given that brat a full faced mush to the floor and Heismanned your son when he tried to stop you as you sprinted full tilt for the garbage can and thrust the money deep inside.
So just say “I don’t need my change, thanks”
See aerie’s post a few posts above. Absolutely every cashier I know hates to hear “keep the change”. It sounds extremely condescending. As with many things in life, the exact same information conveyed in a nicer sounding way will go be the difference between sounding rude and being friendly.
“Heck no, I got too much crap in my pocket already!” is another alternative that doesn’t imply that the cashier should be grateful for your scraps.
That was pretty cool, and I’ll bet you made his day.