I like to get two dollar bills, dollar coins and fifty cent coins from the bank
and then spend them to see what reaction I get from the cashiers. They
will usally just treat them like any other denomination but a few have
mistaken fifty cent coins for dollar coins.
It recently occurred to me that I have never received a two dollar bill or a
fifty cent coin in change. I did get a dollar coin back on one occasion with
the cashier apologizing that he had run out of paper dollars.
I was wondering if anyone else out there has ever received a two dollar bill,
dollar coin or a fifty cent coin in change.
Lately I’ve been on a kick of getting ten-dollar bills from my bank for use when I pay cash. They’re so rare now thanks to ATMs ubiquitously dispensing twenties that you’re more likely to get two five-dollar bills back as change rather than a ten.
20+ years ago, when I used to regularly use the Chicago Transit Authority’s L trains, and the U.S. Mint was pushing the then-new Sacajawea dollar coins, the CTA’s ticket vending machines gave dollar coins as change.
I had forgotten about the stamp vending machines at the US post offices. And
yes, I did get dollar coins in change from those machines. But from a human
cashier only once have I received a dollar coin in change and never a two
dollar bill or fifty cent coin.
I’ve gotten all three in the past, including a Kennedy half dollar and an SBA dollar. I also got a 1935 buffalo nickel in change from a vending machine once.
Got a $2 note recently from a charity that was presumably trying to guilt potential donors into returning a larger donation. Um, I’ve already forgotten which one… not one of my usual ones… so it didn’t work. But now what do I do with the note? …Spend it somewhere, yeah.
I’ve gotten $2 bills as change twice that I can recall. Once at the farmers’ market, where I immediately spent it at another vendor. The other time was at a touristy gift shop in Tanzania of all places (many places in that part of the world take US Dollars, at least places that deal with lots of tourists). I also ended up spending it somewhere else on that trip.
For $1 coins, the ticket machines for Sacramento’s light rail trains used to give them as change (For all I know they still do, but they take credit cards now, too. For that matter you can pay your fare with a phone app now and just skip the ticket machine). I got some as change from the office vending machine once when I paid with a $5 bill, too.
I also got $1 coins as change when I was in Ecuador last year. They use US Dollars as their official currency, and I’ve heard they prefer the coins since they last longer than bills.
I can’t recall ever getting a 50¢ coin as change in my adult life.
I went to a venue where the price for two people to get in was $18. The guy was handing $2 bills out for change for a $20. Nice, crisp, new, two dollar bills that had just come from the bank.
I was in a bar and bought a beer and the bartender threw a 50 cent piece on the bar with my change. And it rang with that special sound only silver makes. Modern metal money sounds dead. I snatched it up in my hand so fast the bartender noticed, I told him, that is silver.
Anyone who grew up in the West Los Angeles area almost certainly ate at Tito’s Tacos. It was a well known tradition there back in the day to get a 50 cent coin back in your change if what you got back was more than 50 cents in coins.
