OK, “cents” for the purists.
In my strolls around the meighborhood, I’m constantly finding a cent here and there.
However, when I look at the change in my pocket, I see an assortment of coins–not just Lincolns.
It is a very, very rare day that I spot a dime, nickel, or quarter–but almost daily I can find a cent.
Does the average person find a penny too worthless to pick up?
As always, the Great One has addressed this.
I’ve had just the same experience with nickels lately. ymmv
Nickels? You know how hard it is to find nickels, even in legitimate change? Quarters, sure. Dimes and pennies, of course. But nickels? I treasure them for thirty and forty cent toll booths. Which will take pennies, but they’re threatening to stop that.
Whenever I get change back from buying something, and there’s only one penny in the assortment of coins, I throw the penny on the ground of the parking lot (it’s bad luck to only have one penny, you know). Maybe that’s what adds to the huge Free Penny population.
Whenever I’ve dropped a penny, I’ve never really bothered to pick it up. Why bother? If it went home with me, it would sit in my giant change-jar, collecting dust with all the other pennies I’ve dropped in there. Ooooh! Let me put another 2 cents in my retirement account! Whoopeee!
Over here, in Australia, the Government has decided for us that 1 & 2 cents pieces are not worth the effort and as such the minumum currency is now 5 cents. At the shops they just round everthing up or down, mostly up, to make things easier. (and more expensive). Add a couple of cents to every purchase for a year and it adds up to a lot of money.
So, am I the only one who looked quickly at the thread title and thought it said, “What’s the deal with penises?” Please tell me I’m not. Please. I beg you.
Yep, I read it that way too at first.
My thoughts on the subject…
I wouldn’t just throw away pennies on the ground because (1) I’d consider it littering and (2) money is money to me–it goes in my change jar (I do save them up and eventually turn them in at the bank).
Back when things were tight I would pick them up when I saw them, save them up into a roll of fifty and exchange them for two quarters (okay, usually I wait til I have like 400, but still…). Two quarters is usually have a wash or dry in the world of laundry.
Now that I’m not in quite the economic straights I was when PLD and I were both in college, etc., I leave the pennies on the ground (actually, I leave ALL change I see on the ground) believe it or not for the homeless or economically challenged (let someone else save them up for laundry or milk money–or whatever). A five or ten-dollar bill may be too tempting to pass up, but the change isn’t.
Also, I heard an interesting report a few years ago that because so many people discard pennies–either on the street or literally throwing them away, the mint has to print more of them than they’d like to keep them in circulation.
And banks have a hard time keeping and/or providing them to merchant customers as well because people just don’t turn in rolls of pennies for cash like they used to. See, banks actually have to pay a premium (though its minimal, its still there) when they “buy” change. Its not exactly a dollar-for-dollar exchange for them. So “buying” a significant amount of pennies for their merchant customers can cost them money and any cost a bank has, it passes onto its customers (and I’ll almost guarantee you its not the merchant customers with big balances and account activity who are paying those costs).
More than anyone wanted to know on the topic I’m sure.
This is like a sickness with me, but I can’t get over the superstition that it is “good luck” to pick up a penny. I often pass one by and then this voice in my head says “Are you so overrun with good fortune that you can pass a little more by? Didn’t you buy a raffle ticket from your coworker’s kid last week? Don’t you NEED the luck?” And then I start wondering “Was it heads up, or tails up? And which is good luck to keep versus good luck to give away” Then another voice chimes in and says “Some homeless person will be real happy to find it. Or a small child will be thrilled. It’s good you left it.”
Picking the penny up the first time I see it is a nice way to preempt this ridiculous inner dialogue.
Thank you PL! I thought my mind was really in the gutter on that one! I least I’m not the only one in the gutter!