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byPowercntrl ( 458442 ) writes:
Is there really any reason we can't just make pennies out of plastic instead? Personally, I haven't used cash in ages anyway so I'm really neither here nor there on running out of pennies, but it seems like if the problem is just that they cost too much to manufacture, make them out of something cheaper.
byserviscope_minor ( 664417 ) writes:
Or just scrap them as a denomination. I'm in the UK where pennies are worth fractionally more. It is now worth considerably less in real terms than the 1/2 p coin when that was scrapped. I, personally in favour of scrapping copper coinage completely. Round the tally to the closest 5 and be done with it.
byZ00L00K ( 682162 ) writes:
The pennies are obsolete.
Basically any denomination below 25 cent could be dropped.
As for banknotes - when more and more payments are done with plastics then the coins could take over for the small payments up to $5 while all banknotes can be scrapped. Robbers would then have to run away with bags of coins that slows them down considerably.
byKisai ( 213879 ) writes:
Let's be real.
The rate of inflation since the 80's (when billions of pennies were made) has increased at a level that doesn't justify having the "1's".
Most prices in Japan, for example, even though they are approximately similar (eg 100 yen = 1 dollar), are denominated in 100's. It just means you have to give up seeing prices marked as '99c'. So just start listing all prices in 10 cent increments, and the problem is fully solved. Then one day we can re-decimalize the currency, or remove it entirely, and now everything is in dollars.
Pretty much the only reason why pennies have to exist was before electronic payments so people could pay sales taxes and stores could play games with their inventory control using the 1's digit. Fun fact, some stores use the last digit to indicate to the staff if an item is on sale or not, and YOU can figure this out by finding something that IS on sale in the store, look at the 1's digit and go find other things on the shelf that don't have a sale price on them, but still has the same 1's digit. (usually 4 or 3)
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byIgnitusBoyone ( 840214 ) writes:
Our non inclusive sales tax setups are going to make things complicated. Lots of places have like 8.5% or 8.25% tax rates. Presumably it's simple to amend the laws, but I just have never thought out the process of well the cost of something is $1.00 and that is $1.0825 so we say 1.08, credit cards make this easy in cash you have to give me $1.10 is that 2c profit? I mean it would add up over an entire day. Should that then be subject to sales tax, who pays the sales tax on the $2.00 in 2c over charges yo
byapocalyptic_mystic ( 7890132 ) writes:
While the shop owner would, in your example, be getting 2c extra, it's balanced out by all the times they lose 2c (for example, if the price ended up being $1.0725 instead, that would round down to 1.05).
bydryeo ( 100693 ) writes:
Here in Canada, they have to round to the nearest nickel. $1.07 becomes $1.05, $1.08 becomes $1.10. It averages out. When we first switched, some stores advertised they always rounded down so you could actually come out a few cents ahead.
Thing was it was a law passed by Parliament, which included the rounding thing rather then a proclamation.
byIgnitusBoyone ( 840214 ) writes:
You can trust America will make this as convoluted as possible and absolutely not crib of any of the number of countries who already do this. I don't expect any american business to actually round if its legal to ceil(sale) and keep the change, but I could see them auto donating it to one of their personal charities. Then somehow benefiting from a write off.
None of this is hard, but it is additional work. People imagine oh the prices will all be 1.05 1.10 and so on, but in reality you want something to b
byomnichad ( 1198475 ) writes:
It just means you have to give up seeing prices marked as '99c'.
If sales taxes were pre-added to the displayed prices, we would be using round numbers. Otherwise, making an uneven number is a huge inconvenience. When the item costing 99 cents actually totals to $1.07 or $1.08 the psychology is more useful than a round number.
bystrikethree ( 811449 ) writes:
Money has no intrinsic value other than as mass. A "penny" is no more worthless than the number 1 is. So you don't like counting by 1's and want to count by 10s since your mental disabilities require you to think of money as a source of value?
I am sure there is a better way to say this, but I am incapable currently. What I am saying is that everyone is insane about money and what it is and what it represents. I imagine this 'confusion' is intentionally garnered.
Another way of saying it is that it appears as
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