# Would you pick up a penny? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 13, 2001, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081 "2001-11-13T05:56:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Flymaster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c4cdca/32.png) [@Flymaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flymaster)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2001, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/21 "2001-11-13T17:54:31Z")
Nope. In fact, I’m the person who’s putting them on the ground. Nickels, too. Unless there’s a trash receptacle nearby, in which case I deposit them there. I don’t want to be a litterbug, you know. ---
**Author:** ![UrbanChic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/9dc877/32.png) [@UrbanChic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UrbanChic)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2001, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/22 "2001-11-13T18:01:57Z")
I hate pennies. When I’m fishing for change in my purse and I come up with pennies, I toss 'em out. One time, I was tossing pennies onto the ground. This old lady gave me _such_ a tongue lashing that I picked up three of 'em just to shut her up. ---
**Author:** ![geepee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ebca7d/32.png) [@geepee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/geepee)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2001, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/23 "2001-11-13T18:09:48Z")
sometimes only recently though , In school (high school that is) the kiddies used to throw them around as ammo , £1 bought you 100 shots , and damnit they used to hurt when 3-4 were glued together and slung at your head. Teachers used to pick them up all the time though and they got about 2-3£ per day i would guess by the amount of copper spread all over the place. ---
**Author:** ![c\_goat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f4b2a3/32.png) [@c\_goat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/c_goat)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2001, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/24 "2001-11-13T18:11:54Z")
Nope, I’m the guy that drops all the pennies. I hate them. ---
**Author:** ![hypergirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/49beb7/32.png) [@hypergirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hypergirl)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2001, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/25 "2001-11-13T18:39:42Z")
Yes…I’m Jewish. ---
**Author:** ![Umbriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/9de053/32.png) [@Umbriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Umbriel)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2001, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/26 "2001-11-13T18:49:09Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by geepee \* > \*\*sometimes only recently though , In school (high school that is) the kiddies used to throw them around as ammo , £1 bought you 100 shots , and damnit they used to hurt when 3-4 were glued together and slung at your head. Teachers used to pick them up all the time though and they got about 2-3£ per day i would guess by the amount of copper spread all over the place. \*\* These were modern, post-decimalization pennies, I trust. I have an old, 1940s vintage English penny at home, and it’s the size of an American half dollar. If you kids were whipping those around, there might have been some fatalities. I remember reading an article some years back by a reporter who had lived among the urban homeless for a while. One tip he had received from an experienced street person was to save up a couple dollars and have it changed into pennies at the bank. Put into an old sock, they made an effective and relatively cheap weapon for self defense. An added bonus was that police wouldn’t confiscate it if you were taken into custody. They wouldn’t want to just take your money away – at most they’d change it for paper, and you could just start over. For the record, I pick up any change I find where it wouldn’t be dangerous or overly messy to do so. Or if the person whose desk it is is likely to miss it. ---
**Author:** ![ignatzmouse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b2d939/32.png) [@ignatzmouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ignatzmouse)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/27 "2001-11-14T00:48:33Z")
A few years ago, while waiting for a friend on Fifth Avenue, NYC, I amused myself by surreptitiously tossing coinage on the ground to see how long I had to wait for someone to pick it up. Quarters and dimes were snapped up, nickles lay there quite a while. Pennies were a lost cause - no one touched them. ---
**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/28 "2001-11-14T04:19:54Z")
Cecil’s analysis: [http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1\_334.html](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_334.html) ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Duality](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr.duality/32/4098_2.png) [@Mr.Duality](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Duality)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 4:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/29 "2001-11-14T04:53:46Z")
Quote from Cecil’s analysis: “…a proficient penny-picker upper can probably pick up a particular penny in five seconds.” Five seconds?! Maybe if it’s 2 or three steps out of the previously planned path of the picker-upper. If it’s laying at your feet you’d have to be a poor physical specimen to need more than 1.5 seconds to grab it. ---
**Author:** ![MovieMogul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f08c70/32.png) [@MovieMogul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MovieMogul)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/30 "2001-11-14T05:15:50Z")
I always do. ---
**Author:** ![Freedom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bc8723/32.png) [@Freedom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freedom)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/31 "2001-11-14T05:32:37Z")
I went to see a friend of mine who is a secretary in an office building. On the way in I noticed that I had a ton of pennies in my pocket. I dropped three of them in a straight line on the way to the elevator, and then I put four more in the corners on the elevator. She wasn’t at her desk so I went to the bathroom. When I came out I bumped into somebody who told me she had just gone downstairs to have a smoke. When I found her outside she was as happy as could be. She couldn’t wait to tell me about the strangest thing that had just happened to her. 🙂 Yes, she found FOUR pennies in the corners of the elevator. Obviously this was good luck. She even showed them to me. On our way back up, she saw the three on the carpet leading to the elevator. She SWORE that those pennies were not there when she had come out. This was obviously an omen of something good to come. I almost died from trying not to laugh and now I always drop pennies in her building in weird arrangements. ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 8:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/32 "2001-11-14T08:57:23Z")
I always collect pennies, but I don’t want to carry them around, so I just leave them in a bag on my desk. Every once in a while, I’ll buy something (a fifty cent donut or ice cream bar) with pennies. Other times I exchange them for quarters when I need to do laundry. ---
**Author:** ![psychogumby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c0e974/32.png) [@psychogumby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychogumby)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 9:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/33 "2001-11-14T09:17:50Z")
Yes, if she was a hottie. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![fierra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/58956e/32.png) [@fierra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fierra)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/34 "2001-11-14T14:55:36Z")
Yes. (who me? Post padding? nah, never happen ;)) ---
**Author:** ![CnoteChris](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/278dde/32.png) [@CnoteChris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CnoteChris)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/35 "2001-11-14T15:06:14Z")
I do, but only if I didn’t drop it. If I did drop it, I’d leave it. It’s a luck thing. ---
**Author:** ![galen\_ubal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/galen_ubal/32/4440_2.png) [@galen\_ubal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/galen_ubal)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2001, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/36 "2001-11-14T15:14:34Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by CnoteChris \* > \*\*I do, but only if I didn’t drop it. If I did drop it, I’d leave it. > > It’s a luck thing. \*\* Opposite. If I drop it I pick it up, but if I see it on the ground, I leave it. I s’pose it’s a neatness thing. ---
**Author:** ![anya\_marie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ebca7d/32.png) [@anya\_marie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/anya_marie)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2001, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/37 "2001-11-15T13:41:15Z")
yes, then i toss it in the can i keep for chump change. ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2001, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/38 "2001-11-15T14:00:22Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Mr. Duality \* > \*\*Assume it takes one and one-half seconds to pick up a penney. Calculate the equivalent rate per hour of picking up pennies. > > 60 seconds divided by 1.5 seconds is 40 cents per minute. To arrive at the rate per hour, multiply 40 cents by 60. Your result is $24.00 per hour, my children. And that’s tax-free. > > Yes, I pick up pennies. \*\* Okay, let’s do some more math. How many pennies are you going to pick up a day? 5? 10? Let’s assume 10. Ten cents a day. If I have one less soda a _week_, I’m saving more money than you’re making picking up pennies. ---
**Author:** ![royjwood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ce73a5/32.png) [@royjwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/royjwood)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2001, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/39 "2001-11-15T14:01:12Z")
I hate pennies!!! Actually I hate all “loose change”!!! Paper is fine, plastic is best. However, no matter what I buy, it seems I always end up with that hateful, worthless junk in my pocket. So, at the end of the day, I place all of the “silver” change in one container and the pennies in another. At the end of each month, I deposit the coins in my bank. Sometimes as much as $100.00 in change alone. But what I really enjoy is giving the change, and especially those horrible pennies, to the children whose parents may not be quite so well off. I currently reside in East Timor, a truly third world country, but their currency is the US dollar (STUPID mistake). So, there are plenty of impoverished kids to whom I may give the change. And it does make them so happy. Yes, I will pick up the pennies, too…just to give them away to the kids. ---
**Author:** ![handy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5a626/32.png) [@handy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/handy)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2001, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081/40 "2001-11-15T16:11:56Z")
Not anymore. But if I looked close & it appeared to be some rare penny, I would. Otherwise, I throw pennies on the sidewalk. At least you know how they got there now. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pick-up-a-penny/93081.md?page=3)