Best political way to get rid of the penny

[robby]

@Cheesesteak

Do you think you can add 5% sales tax to a $1.99 item and get a price that is “naturally” a whole number of cents? How about a 6.75% tax?

All we do today is round to the nearest 1/100th of a dollar. There is nothing inherent in the monetary system that requires the existence of cents, it is entirely a product of our choice to have the smallest unit of currency be 1/100th of our base currency.

I realize this. I’m the one of the people who advocated rounding to the nearest five cents in the first place (in this thread).

I was responding to DrCube, who thinks that you would need to actually change the price of items from “$1.97” to “$1 19/20 or $2” if you eliminated the penny.

I was pointing out that even if you did actually round all prices to the nearest nickel, you would still end up with cents in the price when you added sales tax.

Ergo, there is no point in changing the prices of items. Leave them at $1.97 or whatever. You’re going to have to round anyway, either to the nearest penny (as is done today, as you point out), or to the nearest nickel (if we eliminate the penny).

[Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus]

@Diceman

What country do you live in? The SBA coin has always been abysmally unpopular. The Sackie was also unpopular, tho not to the legendary degree that the SBA was. The current gimmick is the presidential dollar coins (trying to copy the success of the state quarters) but they don’t seem to be catching on either. Basically, the Mint keeps trying, and the US public keeps responding with a dismissive eyeball roll.

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Part of the problem is that the government can’t, or won’t, force the armored carrier companies to make the necessary adjustments. If Brinks’ won’t handle the coins, they don’t get to the retailers and they don’t get given out in change. A very significant portion of the public liked the coins, but was usually unable to get them.

Whenever we have these discussions here, there seem to be about as many for as against.