I’m actually thinking that the low US dollar might be a good thing to jump-start local manufacture in the States, but it wouldn’t last. High transport costs IMHO would be more likely to make long-term conditions favourable to local manufacture.
“Local manufacture” is of virtually no economic importance in the grand scheme of things. It’s simply not economically beneficial to have everything manufactured locally, especially if you’re not in a major metropolitan area. You can’t grow avocadoes in Quebec, you can’t have an injection molding plant in every county, and it’s not feasible to have more than a few factories here and there doing splining on large gears. High transport costs hurt everyone, end of story.
True. But I’m concerned that we may not have a choice but to endure high transport costs in the future. If so, it’d be nice to have some backup systems available for when we run out of Chinese-made shows and undies.
I got some coffee today from the local coffee shop (well, I do this nearly every day, so the guy who runs it knows me). He was making my change, dug around in his till, and said, “Hm. Sorry, Spoons, I’ll have to give you an American quarter.”
Apologizing for giving US currency in change has been unheard of for years–I honestly don’t remember hearing it since I was a child. Then the coffee guy dropped another bombshell:
“Here, have an extra penny, to make up for the exchange.”
Yes, he was having a little fun with a regular customer and we both had a good laugh but still… :eek:
I get paid in £ and live in the US it’s a 
for me
Fun isn’t it.
Wish i was still over there doing the same. It peaked at 1.9ish when i was there and i could often be found sitting at my computer laughing manically on paydays.
One of my regular barman used to joke that back when he lived in Post-Soviet Eastern Europe, he’d always ask the foreigners to pay in dollars if they could. He said that if the dollar/sterling rate ever hit 2.0 he was going to start asking me to pay in pounds.
It’s a fair cop. I meant $2.07. Nearly $2.08 today.
Big sign went up in the company caf today: US EXCHANGE RATE 90%. Yep. Pay a US dollar, get 90 Canadian cents worth of stuff.
If I recall correctly, Sunspace, you’ve got a lot of people from your company’s US branch offices coming through there. And if I recall some of those folks correctly, they’re not gonna like that.
Wish I could be there to see it! 
The real life exchange rate is always worse than the money market rate quoted in the news, but this is a bit low. It may be an accurate reflection of the rate the bank will actually give the business, however. Small businesses get gouged by banks in a number of ways.
I asked Darryl about it–the head chef and boss of the caf is named Darryl–and he said that the actual exchange rate is around 95%, but after the bank takes its cut for exchange fees, there’s not that much difference, and he’ll keep that rate until/unless the actual pre-fee exchange rate changes significantly from 94-96%.
Another time, when I was asking whether they took pounds or euros, he said that they don’t actually get a lot of US dollars there anymore. I think that this is partly because a lot of prearranged mealsfor meeting sand whatever there are billed internally to one account or another, but these days it’s often easier and cheaper for travellers to get their money from an ATM as well. Those booths at the airport (which are charging around 8% as far as I can tell.
(The’ caf doesn’t take pounds or euros. Or Interac*. I wish they took Interac, but apparently the fees are through the roof, plus you need an extra phone line for the terminal.)
[sub]*Interac: Canadian debit cards. Issued by all banks, and unrelaled to Mastercard or Visa.[/sub]
Interac is not that expensive, and obviously helps the merchant with cash handling costs. The little cafeteria in the building I work in has it, and they’re pretty damn small.
Is their bosses’s name Larry?
sigh
You used to tell me I looked like a million bucks. I would always have you qualify your denomination as US or Canadian dollars… of course, you always knew the right answer. But times they are a changin’. 
Just my 5 cents. 
Abraca Deborah
Here’s a site to convert CAD to anything else, with up to five years historical data. The Canadian dollar is kicking ass and taking names, apparently.
I started noticing about a year ago that our dollar was worth much more than 2/3 of an American dollar, yet the price of books was still about 30% higher than the US price. I haven’t been impressed by that for a while now - the last time I bought some books, I noticed that they had a sign by the cash register making excuses for why there is still a 25% or so difference. If it wasn’t for shipping costs, I’d be buying all my books online at US prices now (except Harry Potter - I don’t want those simpering Americanized versions).
The correct answer, of course, is “in whichever currency’s higher”.
Books… the last major books I bought were The Manual of Low-Slope Roof Systems, Building Science for a Cold Climate, and the three Earthship books. The first and third were from Amazon.ca, and the second was from the publisher in Ottawa (the NRC).
I remember that I paid $87 for the three Earthship books when they were selling individually for $34.99 in shops if you could find them.
Ah. my dear, you still look like a million. But perhaps I shouldn’t use those little dollar-things anymore. So…
You look like a million… in sterling!
Five bucks says there’s going to be another editorial in the Star bitching about how retail prices aren’t coming down.
sigh :rolleyes:
at my work (one of the big nightclubs in toronto’s club district,) management refuses to accept payment in u.sian dollars, effective last week. no exchange rate – we simply do not accept u.sian $$ until further notice.
we used to, until this summer, give u.sian currency an enchange rounded to the nearest quarter, in the customer’s favour. around the beginning/middle of this summer we started accepting u.sian dollars only at par. we do still accept american credit cards, though, as they are billed by the company in canadian dollars.
Something must have happened this morning.
It’s now 1 USD = 0.93584 CAD; 1 CAD = 1.06855 USD.