What to do with the penny?
- Thread starter gravitas
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Considering a few years back I watched a show on television that stated it costs the American government .02¢ to make .01¢, I say scrap it! Scrap the fuckin' penny. All it does is make my pants heavy when I get change. Small change itself is dumb as hell. Look at a keyboard, where the hell is the ¢ symbol? Even modern technology can't find a need for ¢........
Most small change costs more to make than its worth. If the American government can't make a penny for less than .02¢, can you imagine what the Canadian government is doing? Maybe .05¢ to make a penny?
Go to McDonalds and place an order, and you will see just how easy it is to fuck with a teenagers head when it comes time to get your change. It's like reality television watching them try to make change. The best place for a penny, is on the ground.
Even homeless people won't stop to pick up a pile of pennies laying on the ground. At one time, a homeless person would walk up to you and ask for 25¢, now days it's at least a buck. Give a homeless person a fist full of pennies, and he will use them to flick across the alley when they get bored.
Now HERE, is a coin I wouldn't mind having!
Most small change costs more to make than its worth. If the American government can't make a penny for less than .02¢, can you imagine what the Canadian government is doing? Maybe .05¢ to make a penny?
Go to McDonalds and place an order, and you will see just how easy it is to fuck with a teenagers head when it comes time to get your change. It's like reality television watching them try to make change. The best place for a penny, is on the ground.
Even homeless people won't stop to pick up a pile of pennies laying on the ground. At one time, a homeless person would walk up to you and ask for 25¢, now days it's at least a buck. Give a homeless person a fist full of pennies, and he will use them to flick across the alley when they get bored.
Now HERE, is a coin I wouldn't mind having!
When I was a teen...
...back in the stone age! a lot of kids wouldn't bend down to pick up a penny. Now the "new penny" seems to be dimes! I don't know whether it's because they are so small, or what... Anyway, I still bend down to pick up pennies, cuz it's still money! (sad but true)
The previous discussion went to the suggestion that prices be rounded up/down....my problem with this is, "do you really think any retailer is going to round DOWN?" Add up thousands of items for $14.96 rounded up 4 cents, and I smell a tremendous cash grab. THAT'S why the penny should still be in circulation.
I'm sure there is someone reading this with a better economic background who can enlighten me to the contrary....
...back in the stone age! a lot of kids wouldn't bend down to pick up a penny. Now the "new penny" seems to be dimes! I don't know whether it's because they are so small, or what... Anyway, I still bend down to pick up pennies, cuz it's still money! (sad but true)
The previous discussion went to the suggestion that prices be rounded up/down....my problem with this is, "do you really think any retailer is going to round DOWN?" Add up thousands of items for $14.96 rounded up 4 cents, and I smell a tremendous cash grab. THAT'S why the penny should still be in circulation.
I'm sure there is someone reading this with a better economic background who can enlighten me to the contrary....
It's no different than anything else. Night clubs charge $3.75 a drink because they know that odds are you will tip the waitress $1.25 per drink. Maybe I'm too carefree with my cash, I just see no need for pennies. And if it's costing the government more to make them that they are worth, why bother...?BigBlue said:
Dump truck full of pennies? Shit, I know what your going to be doing for the last 30 years of life. Rolling pennies. Thats a lot of fuckin' pennies.hitrack said:
A lot of towns and cities have that one crazy lady with cats. Other towns and cities have that crazy dude who spends his day, curtains closed, beer in hand, Led Zepplin on the stereo, rolling mountains of pennies.
An American penny costs 1.4¢ to make (it is mostly made of zinc - which is relatively expensive - with a copper coating).ScottyTwoHotty said:
A Canadian penny costs 0.008¢ to make (steel with a copper coating)
http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/realitycheck/20060426sheppard.html
A dump truck full of pennies? Scroll to the bottom of the article.
"A penny weighs 2.5 g. That means you would need 408,163 pre-1997 pennies to end up with a tonne of copper. As legal tender, this stash would be worth $4,081.63 but as a potential truckload of copper destined for China this would bring in US$7,230 just now on the LME futures market. "
Can you say kaa-ching?
We should get rid of the penny, and not stop there. Get rid of all the fuckin' money, paper and coin. Govt. wouldn't have to spend a penny printing or minting any new cash. Make currency totally virtual. Shit, with credit cards and debit cards, we're practically there anyways.
Unless they come out with debit cards that are completely anonymous with no way of tracing them back to the actual owner I can't see cash disappearing completely. Too many people wouldn't want all their transactions to be traceable. I for one would never pay for a SP with a debit or credit card.FuZzYknUckLeS said:
I tend to agree...
)? That way, you could still have items with the good old odd-numbered price (ie "$1.99") without rounding up or down.
Hmm....just came to me....these cards would be easily "liftable" (but no more than a sweaty wad of cash), but what kind of a trail would they lead...I mean, cash is as anonymous as we can get, but would a "cash debit card", if found, have an electronic trail of every previous purchase?
We also have gas cards and phone cards loaded with money for a specific purpose (gas and phone calls).....why not have "cash cards" in addition to debit cards that are loaded with a cash value good at any retailer, which is untracable (is there any such thing? I smell the conspiracy theorists lurking in the wingsFuZzYknUckLeS said:
)? That way, you could still have items with the good old odd-numbered price (ie "$1.99") without rounding up or down.Hmm....just came to me....these cards would be easily "liftable" (but no more than a sweaty wad of cash), but what kind of a trail would they lead...I mean, cash is as anonymous as we can get, but would a "cash debit card", if found, have an electronic trail of every previous purchase?
Bad idea. You may like the convenience of virtual money, but so do the authorities with the extra power this gives them. This is a key element in the conversion to a total police state. I prefer cash, even if it is in pennies.FuZzYknUckLeS said:
Good one!cancowboy2001 said:
Holy shit! Ya stumped me on that one! Either way, thats a lot of coin rollers and a lot of time rolling pennies!cancowboy2001 said:
Get rid of the penny?? WTF!!!????? Why just today, I went to Subway and ordered the veggie delight sub for today's meal and a veggie delight salad to take to work tomorrow. And was it the usual price of $9.54? Noooooooooo! It was a measly $9.47 thanks to the stupendous savings caused by the reduction in GST. If there were no longer pennies, my seven cent savings would have been just five cents. Scrap the penny, my ass!
Retailers would have rounded prices up or down to the nearest 5 cents a long time ago.
Nope, pennies are in existence for one reason only - freakin' taxes!
Nope, pennies are in existence for one reason only - freakin' taxes!
Simple! Devaluate the dollars (C$ & US$) to 1970s levels, and watch the rest of the planet trying to catch up. Our economy would enjoy a sudden boom in demand, you could buy a newspaper for a nickel again, and the dollar would be worth something for a change (no pun).
Simplistic yes, but effective...
Simplistic yes, but effective...
Not to mention the US government is tracking paper money via the secret RFID tag.georgebushmoron said:
http://www.prisonplanet.com/022904rfidtagsexplode.html
Don't forget your tinfoil hat!!
They are a pain in the ass but I saw something on tv a few years ago where a direct mail marketing guy said that if you sent coin wrappers to every canadian household about 5% of them would fill them with pennies and take them to the bank. This would save the mint several million dollars. The mint's response: they totally ignored him even when confronted by the tv reporters about it.
So there are alternative solutions.
So there are alternative solutions.
