Exactly, they did’t take the obvious step of making it compulsory.
In Australia they removed 1 and 2 cent coins years ago. All prices are rounded to the nearest 5 cents for physical transations only.
All the objections I read above seem to fail to consider that the experiment has already been run at least twice, here and in NZ. And there were no negative effects on charities, no “penny fraud”, it just happened, no-one complained, everyone got on with life.
I RECENTLY DISCOVERED A NEWLEY PRESSED PENNEY ON MY FRIDGE IT IS NO LONGER 100%COPPER,MAYBE THAT EXPLAINS
WHY IT STUCK TO AN OLD MAGNET BESIDE IT.
PERHAPS THERE"S A MESSAGE IN THAT!SINCE IT WAS COSTING THE CND GOV 2 OR 3 CENTS TO MINT IT I GUESS THE PENNY IS SLOWLY DYING:o
The penny hasn’t been made of much copper for a long time.
http://www.usmint.gov/about_the_mint/fun_facts/index.cfm?flash=yes&action=fun_facts2
I WAS ON ABOUT THE CANADIAN PENNY WHILE I KNEW YOU WERE ON ABOUT YOURS!I KNEW THE US PENNY STUCK TO A MAGNET .THAT HOW I KEPT THEM SEPERATED IN MY TRUCK!
OH WELL ,NEITHER PENNY IS WORTH THE TIME OF DAY!
BUT I WAS A BIT SURPRISED TO SEE THIS RUSTY SLUG NEAR SINK,
FOUND IT TO BE A PENNY,CANADIAN PENNIES NEVER RUSTED! AND TO BEST OF MY KNOWLEGE WERE ALWAYS 100% COPPER!
OH WELL TIMES ARE A CHANGING!
EVEN THE CANADIAN MINT HAS GONE ELCHEAPO! NO SLAM INTENDED,JUST A CURIUOS POINT!
OH DEHHEX :
AM I ALLOWED TO CHANGE THE SUBJECT NOW??:rolleyes:
Sir, your caps lock key appears to be stuck in the ‘down’ position. Please advise.
Has anyone stopped to think about the implications to the stock market alone by changing the lowest monetary valuation to $0.05 from $0.01? Even if you kept the penny for trading purposes only, you would still be forced to round everything off afterward. Heavy traders would begin to force prices above/below the $0.025 mark to influence the market into rounding prices in their favour at the end of the day.
The volatility in higher priced securities would not be dramatically affected, to be sure. $1.00-$3.00 stocks, on the other hand, might never recover from even a minor tumble. Lets not even mention the inflationary effects on a rising stock constantly being rounded up after trading had ceased for the day.
Another solution might be to maintain the penny during trading, but then do the rounding upon the sale of the security. That might also prove catastrophic for our economy, though. The rich would be able to manipulate the system to get an extra 2.5 cents or so per share, while others would be forced to compensate; ever-widening the gap between the grossly rich and the poor.
Aside from these possibilities, the only other solution I see would be to trade exclusively in nickel denominations. As much as I’d like to see Lucent shares shoot back up, I don’t think that severely inflating the stock market is the right way to do that.
I’m all for getting rid of useless coins, but I believe eliminating the penny and conducting all business by the nickel would have horrendous effects on the economy. There are surely some faults in my logic here, but rounding everything up/down to the nearest $0.05 really doesn’t seem like a smart path to take right now to help our struggling economy. Especially with the dollar continually slipping away from the Euro.
Just my $.02 
I would think the market would work in pennies, same as usual. Rounding would not occur per share, but on the bulk purchase, only when paid for, i.e. money changes hands.
And with our electronic system, we could further institute all rounding only occurs on cash transactions, and electronic transactions remain at the penny.
Actually, you might look closer. The pennies that stick to a magnet would be *Canadian ones minted since 2000 because they’re steel. US cents will NOT stick to a magnet(except the 1943 steel one).
Exactly. I see that the current price for units of a fund in my 401(k) is $25.417808. They can handle that without needing to mint coins to handle 8/10,000 of a cent.
Or, equally easy, the exchanges could institute rules limiting trades to multiples of $.05, just as in years past they limited them to eighths of a dollar. Sometimes, answers are simple.
Ask the people that collect sales taxes. -Rod-
Poor design is the culprit, IMHO.
Susan B. Anthony coins looked and felt too much like quarters. Too easy to spend a dollar when you meant to spend a quarter… and this isnt’ too far-fetched given how clueless your typical teenage store clerk is.
Sacajawea (sp?!) is gold-colored and pretty, and given the precedent of Susan B., people hoard them. I guess they think that they really are gold, and/or they’re not gonna last long so better hold on to as many as we can so we can sell them on Ebay in 20 years. They work well as subway tokens and at vending machines, cause they don’t get all wrinkled and stuff.
One more observation, when I was in Scotland a few years ago, they still had one-pound notes in addition to one-pound coins. English people seemed to resent that the Scottish banks kept printing them, because they had to accept them as legal tender but had no place to put them in their cash drawers. I remember several occasions getting change from a 10 or 20 pound note in coins… ugh those things get heavy. I can see why there is resistance to doing away with $1 bills.
Nope. We’ve done this theory to death.
Any dollar coin that the US made would circulate by default if there were no one dollar bill circulating along side it.
So how come the pound counds circulate so well in Scotland, when the pound notes still exist? Do you really think there is that much of a cultural difference?
:smack: pound COINS… not counds… see what happens when I post after midnight?
I have a Canadian penny with a picture of some old, bald guy on it. Apparently, it was QE’s dad. Who knew?
Her dad had hair. I think your penny is just well-worn. A new one would show his hair.
I thought Canadian pennies had maple leaves or beavers or something on them… maybe I’m just confused.
Maple leaf on reverse, the monarch on the obverse. Since 1920.
ON the NICKELS, you get a beaver on the reverse.
Ahh ok. Thanks